A US judge has decided that Twitter might indeed be the best way to finally slap a lawsuit on a hard-to-find Kuwaiti religious leader accused of raising money for terrorists in Syria.
Hajjaj bin Fahd al-Ajmi is being sought by a lawyer who is using a northern California federal court to sue on behalf of thousands of Assyrian Christians who own property in Iraq and Syria, US News reports. Thus far, however, the Kuwaiti man has been impossible to serve.
So they'll tweet him. Magistrate Judge Laurel Beeler has found that al-Ajmi has an active Twitter account that he still appears to use. "The court grants St. Francis's request because service via Twitter is reasonably calculated to give notice and is not prohibited by international agreement," Beeler wrote in the ruling, Courthouse News Service informs. (St. Francis of Assisi, an Alameda Christian nonprofit group that assists refugees, is the entity suing al-Ajmi as well as the banks Kuwait Finance House and Kuveyt-Turk Participation Bank Inc.)
This is not the first time social media has been used for process service. In 2013, a federal judge in Virginia allowed the Federal Trade Commission to use Facebook to serve individuals in India accused of fraud; in 2014, a federal judge allowed service via Facebook and LinkedIn to reach a Turkish citizen; and in 2015 a New York judge ruled that divorce papers can be served over Facebook.
St. Francis attorney Mogeeb Weiss said his clients are preparing a mechanism to put notices on al-Ajmi’s Twitter account, reports Courthouse News Service. "We will tweet it at them with a link where the summons and complaint can be obtained."
Weiss called the decision "huge."
"You have a Twitter account and are trying to avoid service? Now I can just get you on Twitter … You can just serve them there on the spot," he said, US News reports. (Though attorneys will have to demonstrate that traditional methods of process service have failed, he pointed out.)
Al-Ajmi is also accused by the US government and the UN Security Council of funding armed terrorist groups by campaigning for donations through Twitter, then funneling the money through Kuwait Finance House and Kuveyt-Turk Participation Bank. He was detained in August 2014 by Kuwaiti authorities for financing Al Nusra Front and is accused of traveling between Kuwait and Syria to raise and deliver money.
Finding and serving al-Ajmi still may not happen immediately. Twitter first shut down an account of his in 2014; since then, he has opened accounts on Instagram and Facebook, only to see them eventually closed as well, as the social media sites crack down on accounts threatening or promoting terrorist activity.
Weiss told US News he plans to tweet a link to two accounts associated with al-Ajmi, and if they end up shutting down before he makes contact, al-Ajmi is sure to see the tweet directed at other organizations he has links to.
