Hani al-Sayegh  Hani Abdel Rahim Hussein al-Sayegh () is a Saudi citizen, and alleged member of Hezbollah Al-Hejaz and accused of involvement in the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing. He was one of 14 people subjected to extraordinary rendition by the CIA prior to the 2001 declaration of a War on Terror. Although he appeared to be innocent, American officials released a falsified account of his interrogations and deported him back to Saudi Arabia, where it was presumed he faced beheading. Despite the lack of evidence against him, Hani Al-Sayegh was one of the individuals named later in an indictment issued by the US Justice Department  As a young man, al-Sayegh had joined the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, but following a "particularly disastrous exercise" where his asthma interfered, he was told to leave the corps. He left Saudi Arabia in August 1995, and moved to Iran where he studied, and then Kuwait. In August 1996, after traveling through Rome and Boston, al-Sayegh arrived in Canada where he applied for refugee and permanent resident status, while living in Ottawa. He claimed to belong to a minority Shi'ite group, and that he and his brother Mohamed had both been tortured by Saudi officials. The 28-year-old al-Sayegh was arrested in a grocery store in March 1997, and hired immigration lawyer Douglas M. Baum to defend himself. Canada accused him of driving one of two vehicles which had accompanied the car bomb, and had waved the bomber forward to indicate the parking lot was safe to enter, and sought to deport him. However, since al-Sayegh was a "frail" man suffering from frequent attacks of asthma, the accusation that he had been a getaway driver was criticised. The evidence against him was based largely on a meeting, believed to have occurred two years before the bombing, between Sayegh and Ahmad Sherifi a senior Iranian intelligence officer also accused.  al-Sayegh argued that he had been studying in Iran for four years, including during the time the bombing took place, and that his phonecall to the Iranian embassy on the day the attacks was simply to help a friend obtain a visa. The United States stated that despite early excitement, it did not appear to have enough evidence to extradite al-Sayegh. They also criticised Canada, stating that the arrest actually foiled surveillance efforts that would have been more fruitful. Canada issued a security certificate to deport him, but sent him to the United States rather than Saudi Arabia, since Attorney General Janet Reno had granted an exception allowing him into the country for the sole sake of prosecution.