Poor financial decisions with a Chicago futures brokerage firm lost an alleged al-Qaeda operative with links to Osama bin Laden some $20 million dollars in just eight months, according to a lawsuit filed recently in Chicago by the U.S. Department of Justice.
Federal officials said Abu al Tayyeb, through an associate, deposited nearly $27 million — earned from a “Saudi Arabian-based investment scheme” — into an account with Chicago-based R.J. O’Brien & Associates in 2005. But because of a “poor trading position adopted” by the associate, the money dropped below $7 million less than a year later.
