Umar Farouk Mutallab's arraignment

MICHIGAN

Tomorrow (Jan 8, 2009), the entire world will have their eyes on the city of Detroit. 23 year old Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab - the man charged with trying to blow up a plane on christmas day will appear in Detroit's federal court on fort & shelby.

►There will be 77 seats in total.
►3 rows have been reserved for jury .
►Although 2 seats have been reserved for Umar's mother and father, their is no assurance that they will be present.
►Once the reserved seats have been taken, the press & public will enter on a first come first serve basis until all 77 seats have been filled up.
►While Mutallab faces judgement, the muslim- Americans will have a peaceful protest outside the court house.
►Downtown detroit will be packed with federal agents and police officers for safety reasons.
►Everyone will go through metal detector and show identification. No cell phones or lap tops allowed.
►Detroit Police are asking people who are planning to come down for that demonstration to carpool to relieve some of the congestion.

WASHINGTON

President Barack Obama suggested today he would not fire anyone for the attempted Christmas airline attack, saying it appears the security lapses that led to the near-disaster were not the fault of a single individual or institution. "Ultimately the buck stops with me," said the commander in chief.

He declared anew that the government had the information to prevent the botched attack but failed to piece it together. He announced a range of changes designed to fix that, including wider and quicker distribution of intelligence reports, stronger analysis of them and new terror watch list rules.

UPDATES (jan 8, 2009)

DETROIT (AP) — A not guilty plea has been entered on behalf of a Nigerian man charged with attempting to blow up a Detroit-bound U.S. airliner on Christmas Day.

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was arraigned Friday on six charges. The most severe carries up to life in prison — the attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction.

Friday's hearing was brief. Abdulmutallab walked into the courtroom wearing a white T-shirt, pants and tennis shoes.

He answered "yes" in English when asked if he understood the charges against him.

After that, his lawyer said Abdulmutallab would stand mute to the charges. The U.S. magistrate judge said a not guilty plea would be entered on his behalf.

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