US gives its 'regrets' and a payout to American Muslim for post-9/11 ordeal
Washington apologises and pays US$415,000 to an American jailed for 16 days without being charged amid the backlash after September 11
Abdullah al-Kidd approached the Dulles International Airport ticket counter in March 2003 expecting to catch a flight to Saudi Arabia to study Arabic and Islamic law.
Instead, federal agents slapped handcuffs on the Kansas-born former University of Idaho running back.
He spent the next 16 days in three jails without criminal charges on a warrant as a potential witness in a terrorism-related case. He was shackled, strip-searched and confined to a cell.
The government's case eventually fell apart, but not before the husband and father had lost his family and livelihood.
More than a decade later, the US government has presented Kidd with something rarely seen in the US "war against terrorism": an apology.
"The government acknowledges that your arrest and detention as a witness was a difficult experience for you and regrets any hardship or disruption to your life that may have resulted from your arrest and detention," Wendy Olson, the US prosecutor in Idaho, wrote to Kidd on January 15.