JUNE 1992 Abdul Rahman Yasin, born in Bloomington, Ind., in 1960, gets a U.S. passport by filing a “lost/theft” statement at the American Embassy in Jordan.
SEPTEMBER 1992 Ramzi Ahmed Yousef arrives at Kennedy airport in New York, traveling on an Iraqi passport. His companion on the flight, Ahmad Ajaj, is arrested with a fake Swedish passport. Bomb-making videos and manuals are found in Ajaj’s luggage. Yousef applies for political asylum and is immediately released. He moves in with other Muslim conspirators in Jersey City and gets to work.
FEBRUARY 1992 Days before the bombing Yousef uses the phone at a bank around the corner from the house in Jersey City where chemicals were mixed to make explosives.
FEB. 26, 1993 Convicted conspirator Mohammed Salameh and a man believed to be Yousef drive a Ryder rental van to the World Trade Center garage before dawn. The bomb explodes at 12:18 p.m. A few hours later, carrying a Pakistani passport with a false name, Yousef boards a Pakistan International Airlines flight to Karachi. Salameh is arrested when he tries to collect the deposit on the rental van. He needs the money to get out of the country.
MARCH 1993 Yasin, having cooperated with the FBI, is quickly released and flees to Jordan. Investigators believe he lives in a comfortable, tree-shaded house in Baghdad.
