....One source said Maltbie struggled in his first days in Cleveland, but he has been regarded as a top supervisor in one of the bureau's most closely watched units.

"He has done a good job since he has been here," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Ronald Bakeman, who took Damra's case to the grand jury. "He hasn't hindered anything that we've done. I don't know about what happened in the past, but it isn't a concern of mine. "

During the Damra investigation, Maltbie - who speaks Arabic - has supervised agent Tim Riley, who is considered by many a rising star in the Cleve land FBI.

....McGinness has developed a deep-seated passion for fighting the government, partly out of distrust and partly because he believes it goes after people who lack the resources to fight back.

One day after McGinness represented Damra in court, the attorney's nemesis, the U.S. Justice Department, released a statement saying one of his clients had been deported for helping the Nazis in Lithuania.

....McGinness, 61, of Shaker Heights, has represented eight men in suspected-Nazi cases. He has claimed the government has gone after minor figures, often simple men forced into the Nazis' service.

In 1995, he defeated the government in its case against George Lindert of Canfield, who was able to maintain his citizenship. But three of his clients have left the country after prosecutors sought deportation. Four cases are pending.

....Gwin's control on the bench is apparent quickly.

Lawyers said the former Stark County Common Pleas judge has delivered some of the toughest sentences on the federal bench since President Clinton appointed him in 1997.

....In June 2001, he ordered David Mayle, then 53, to 30 years in prison for stealing $5,000 in Social Security checks from a friend who disappeared. The charge - mail fraud - usually nets a person about 18 months.

Gwin said he based the sentence on two days of testimony concerning evidence that Mayle killed three men from Ohio and Florida and might have killed one more, even though Mayle has never been convicted of the slayings.

Given that attitude, if Damra is convicted of the relatively minor charge of lying on his citizenship forms about his past ties to terror groups, the seriousness of the consequences of his alleged fund raising does not bode well for the imam of hate.