Ingram knew quite a bit about collateralized debt obligations because he had previously worked as the head of the mortgage-backed securities desks at Goldman Sachs and Deutsche Bank. After leaving the big banks, Ingram ran his own high-flying company that specialized in trading mortgage bonds and mortgage derivatives, such as CDOs.
In addition, according to the DOJ, Ingram had gone into multiple lines of business with an Egyptian named Diaa Badr Mohsen, who had warehouses full of weapons –
including Cobra helicopters, and Stinger missiles – in Miami and New Jersey.
Acting on a tip from a diamond trader named Randy Glass, the FBI began investigating the Egyptian as part of a larger sting operation focused on a mysterious Pakistani who was trying to buy components for nuclear weapons.
The court documents in the Ingram case do not name the Pakistani, but they make it clear that the Egyptian, Diaa Badr Mohsen, had expressed interest in supplying weapons to him. They also make it clear that the Egyptian had previously sold a lot of weapons to people in Pakistan and that he laundered the money from these weapons sales through Kevin Ingram.
In June 2001, the FBI arrested Ingram as he was about to board his private airplane and fly to Europe with more than $2 million in cash that he had obtained from undercover FBI agents posing as arms dealers.
The FBI also arrested the Egyptian Diaa Badr Mohsen, along with a Pakistani liquor store owner in New Jersey named Mohammed Raja Malik, who also dealt in sophisticated weaponry.
A few months later, the September 11 attacks occurred, and the FBI questioned the Egyptian Diaa Badr Mohsen extensively. This was because the FBI determined that it was likely that the Egyptian Diaa Badr Mohsen was tied to Al Qaeda. Indeed, the bureau suspected that the Egyptian might have direct ties to the 9-11 hijackers.
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