Colo. truck school investigated

Magazine: 35 Arab-speaking men got licenses; FBI won't comment

By David Migoya Denver Post Staff Writer

Sunday, October 14, 2001 - Federal agents in Denver are investigating a report that a Henderson truck-driving school taught as many as 35 Arab-speaking men to drive tractor-trailers, but the men never asked for help finding jobs, according to a Time magazine report due out Monday.

The investigation is part of a broader sweep by agents looking into possible uses of trucks and planes as terrorism weapons, such as the trucks used in the 1998 bomb attacks on U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

The magazine, citing anonymous sources, said the men all received Colorado truck-driving licenses despite their inability to speak any English, a state requirement for licensees to be English proficient, and a test that's entirely in English. The Time article claims the men, who attended the school in small groups, all had the same interpreter.

But a man who has taught at Careers Worldwide trucking school for the last four years says the report is bogus and that the men never attended the school.

"It couldn't have happened," classroom instructor Jack Atencio told The Denver Post. "I'm there every Saturday. I start every person in that school. And there's never been anybody sitting in that classroom with an interpreter at all."

Denver FBI spokeswoman Ann Atanasio refused to comment on the Time article, which says state motor vehicle officials characterized the information as "a promising lead."

The Adams County school trained the men to drive the rigs over the past two years, according to the Time article.

The owner of the trucking school, Charles Tweedy, could not be reached for comment Saturday.

A former partner of the school, Kathy Burch, doubted the magazine's claims.

"We're terribly disgusted with any notion of non-English-speaking people obtaining commercial driver licenses, and we've always guarded against that, even when we were with Charlie," said Burch, adding that she and her husband, Bill, haven't spoken to Tweedy in years. "There's no way this could have happened."

Commercial driving schools in Colorado can administer the basic operator's skill test necessary to obtain a commercial license, as well as administer the required written knowledge test to an enrolled student.

The school and Tweedy were certified to administer the exams necessary for the men to obtain their licenses.

Time said Tweedy confirmed the FBI had reviewed his school's files and interviewed his employees, but denied that non-English speakers were being trained there.

Atencio said FBI agents visited the school for about two hours last week and were specific about the information they wanted.

"From what I understand, they didn't find anything that they were looking for," Atencio said.

Between 25 and 35 men attended the school in small groups, and each paid as much as $3,400 cash for the two-week course, Time quoted ex-employees of the company as saying.

A commercial driver's license in Colorado costs $25.60, is valid for four years and can be obtained only by a state resident who is at least 21 years old. It also requires a doctor's certificate showing the person is physically qualified to drive a commercial vehicle.

Officials with the Colorado Department of Revenue, or its motor vehicle group that oversees licensing, could not be reached Saturday.

Last month authorities arrested more than two dozen people in several states who obtained special license certifications to transport hazardous materials allegedly through a bribery scheme in Pennsylvania.

Officials have not ruled out that the men, many of whom at one time lived in the same Washington town, were part of a criminal or terrorist conspiracy.

Following those arrests, federal investigators have blanketed the country's more than 600 truck-driving schools with requests for enrollment records, going as far as to show photos of the 19 hijackers in the Sept. 11 attacks in New York City and on the Pentagon.

Authorities' methods in checking trucking schools are similar to those used last month after it was suspected that terrorists were planning to use small aircraft such as crop dusters for the next attack.

Denver Post staff writer John Ingold contributed to this report.

-- Anonymous, October 14, 2001