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Former FBI translator gets probation for doctored transcript

Abdirizak Wehelie admitted to doctoring transcripts
Posted at 10:59 AM, Jan 31, 2020
and last updated 2020-01-31 12:24:15-05

ALEXANDRIA, Va. -- A former FBI translator who admitted doctoring transcripts of intercepted phone calls has been placed on probation.
Sixty-eight-year-old Abdirizak Wehelie of Burke, Virginia, also received a $1,000 fine at his sentencing Friday in federal court.
U.S. sentencing guidelines called for a term of zero to six months.
Wehelie admitted marking himself down as an "unidentified male" when he heard his own voice on calls made by a terrorism suspect.
The suspect left a message on Wehelie's cellphone in 2012 while he was working as a contract linguist for the FBI. The person who called Wehelie was under investigation at the time for helping a person join a militant Somali group designated as terrorists by the U.S.