Hijackers' Roommate Arrested

— -- Hijackers’ Alleged Roommate Indicted

July 2 — An alleged roommate of two of the Sept. 11 hijackers who crashed a plane into the Pentagon was indicted today for visa fraud.

FBI agents and State Department officials took Rasmi Al Shannaq into custody last week for overstaying his visa and possible visa fraud.

Sources told ABCNEWS that Al Shannaq admitted he had roomed with two of the hijackers, Hani Hanjour and Nawaq Al Hazmi, in Northern Virginia for two months last summer. Both men, government officials say, were on American Airlines Flight 77 when it crashed into the Pentagon, and Hanjour is believed to have been the pilot.

Today's indictment accuses Al Shannaq, a Jordanian national, of knowingly obtaining a fraudulent nonimmigrant visa from the U.S. Embassy in Doha, Qatar, in October 2000. The indictment does not mention anything about a possible connection to Hanjour and Al Hazmi.

Al Shannaq's initial court appearance is scheduled before the federal magistrate on July 8. Sources have said FBI investigators want to know if Al Shannaq had any association with the Sept. 11 hijackers, and believe he may have been in a position to know a lot more about the hijackers than anyone they've talked to so far.

— Pierre Thomas and Beverley Lumpkin, ABCNEWS

Experts: Suicide Pilots a Threat Despite Security

W A S H I N G T O N, July 2 — Despite post-Sept. 11 security improvements,the White House and other landmarks remain vulnerable to a suicidepilot carrying a private planeload of explosives, experts say.

Three recent incidents showed how easily private planes canenter restricted zones:

Over the weekend, Air Force jets scrambled twice to intercepttwo private planes that inadvertently entered the restricted airspace around Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland wherePresident Bush was staying.

Less than two weeks earlier, an errant private pilot flew intothe restricted area around the Washington Monument, which put theaircraft as near as four miles to the White House.

In February, a 15-year-old boy stole an airplane from a flightschool at the St. Petersburg-Clearwater International Airport inFlorida and smashed it into the 28th floor of a downtown Tampaoffice building, killing himself.

Private planes remain barred from Ronald Reagan WashingtonNational Airport across the Potomac River from the capital, and theWashington Monument restrictions prohibit them from flying lowerthan 18,000 feet within a 15-mile radius of the monument.