Alimzhan Tokhtakhounov, seen here in 2002, is accused of running a sports-betting ring that catered to Russian oligarchs in the former Soviet Union, and laundered proceeds through Cyprus banks to the United States.

NEW YORK - Federal authorities have charged a prominent New York art dealer and one of Russia's top reputed mobsters with operating high-stakes gambling rings in New York and Los Angeles that catered to billionaires, bank executives, movie stars and professional athletes.

Among 34 people indicted are suspected Russian organized crime figure Alimzhan Tokhtakhounov, who was charged in 2002 with plotting to rig sports events at the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics. Tokhtakhounov remains outside of the United States, and that case has not gone to trial.

Also charged was Hillel "Helly" Nahmad, a leading international art dealer and the owner of an exclusive art gallery that bears his name inside Midtown Manhattan's posh Carlyle Hotel.

The gallery was raided on Tuesday as part of the investigation, authorities said.

According to an 83-page indictment unsealed on Tuesday, Tokhtakhounov ran a sports-betting ring that catered to Russian oligarchs in the former Soviet Union, and laundered proceeds through Cyprus banks to the United States.

A second, related operation in New York and Los Angeles allegedly served wealthy U.S. clients including Hollywood celebrities, Wall Street executives and professional athletes, authorities said.

That operation was allegedly run by Nahmad, who was expected to surrender on Tuesday in Los Angeles, a spokeswoman for Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said.

Tokhtakhounov, according to court documents, used his reputation as a mobster to "resolve disputes with clients of high-stakes illegal gambling operation with implicit and sometimes explicit threats of violence and economic harm."

Tokhtakhounov was indicted by federal authorities in New York in 2002 on charges that he plotted to rig the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics pairs figure skating and ice dancing competitions.

He was arrested that year in Italy, whose highest appeals court ruled in 2003 against extraditing him to the United States. He was released by the Italian court.

According to court papers, Tokhtakhounov earned $10 million in 2011 alone as head of the gambling ring.

He is known in Russia as a "vory v zakone," or a "vor," a Russian term that translates to "Thief-in-Law" and refers to the highest echelon of Russian organized crime figures, according to prosecutors.

A number of defendants in the case, of whom 30 were in custody, were expected to appear in federal court in Manhattan later on Tuesday.

Michael Fineman, an attorney for defendant Vadim Trincher, 52, declined to comment after court.

Dana Cole, an attorney for Molly Bloom, who was arrested in Los Angeles and faces bookmaking charges only, said a judge released his client on Tuesday afternoon into the custody of her mother. She is scheduled to appear again in a New York federal courtroom on Friday.

Cole said that while he did not want to "minimize the seriousness" of the charges, "this is not the crime of the century."

Tokhtakhounov and three other indicted suspects - Abraham Mosseri, Donald McCalmont, and William Edler - remain at large and are wanted by federal officials, said Kelly Langmesser, a spokesman for the New York field office of the FBI.

None of the rich and famous clients of the alleged ring were charged or named by authorities on Tuesday. A person who answered the phone at the Nahmad Gallery in New York declined to comment on the indictments. 

Any major bomb investigation is an elaborate, high-tech piece of choreography by city, state and federal agencies with two goals: helping investigators figure out who built and planted the explosive device or devices and preserving evidence so that they can be brought to justice.

And the forensic investigation established soon after the twin blasts at Monday’s Boston Marathon has already begun yielding results. On Tuesday afternoon, law enforcement officials had indications that the bombs were made from pressure cookers filled with explosives, nails and BBs, and that they were placed in black nylon bags.

The work is far from over. Fragments, blood smears and explosive residue from the Boylston Street crime scene -- all of it will be carefully cataloged and examined. Every frame of video and every photo will be scrutinized, a mammoth undertaking in light of authorities’ pleas for spectators to turn over their images.

There’s other evidence to consider, too. A smell of sulfur in the air could indicate smokeless black powder was used. The size and color of a fireball could point to certain additives. Certain bomb mechanisms -- a type of fuse, a type of timer -- could be signatures of a particular group.

Alex Trautwig/Getty Images

A member of the bomb squad investigates a suspicious item on the road near Kenmore Square after two bombs exploded during Boston Marathon on April 15.

"In an investigation of this nature, no detail is too small," Attorney General Eric Holder said Tuesday.

As the data piles up, investigators will begin to get some idea of who was behind the horrific act: an amateur or a professional bomb-maker, a home-grown lone wolf or a foreign-sponsored terrorist gang.

Early indications were pointing toward a sophisticated creator, as the bombs were designed and placed to act like a "homemade claymore," a powerful, directional anti-personnel device, sources involved in the investigation said.

These and other sources say that the triggering mechanism appears to have included a battery pack and a circuit board, the elements they said of a sophisticated triggering mechanism. Both of those elements were recovered at the scene.

"It appeared to be built from scratch but with a sophisticated triggering mechanism. And frankly, at the end of the day, all bombs are crude devices, and it is the way they are triggered that can be sophisticated," said one official with strong knowledge of explosives. "They functioned as designed."

In these kinds of investigations, the forensic process begins as soon as police have done what they can to preserve human life and clear the area, with bomb technicians and emergency service cops canvassing for devices that may not have exploded yet.

Protection from contamination
In Boston, officials confirmed they used controlled explosions -- usually done with water cannons -- on five suspicious packages that turned out not to be bombs.

Afterward, uniformed officers -- in Boston's case, the National Guard -- secure the perimeter of the blast site to protect the evidence from contamination until the specialists can bag, tag and transport it to a central location, where a prosecutor would ideally be supervising the chain of custody, local and federal officials say.

Boston's FBI Special Agent in Charge Richard DesLauriers said that recovery effort officially began Tuesday morning.

In these investigations, the entire area is photographed and investigators begin a grid search, working outward from the seat of the blast, swiping fragments for explosive residue and gathering anything that could be a clue. In Boston, debris has been found on roofs and embedded in buildings. What’s recovered will be sent to the FBI lab in Quantico, where it will eventually be logged on a grid, according to law-enforcement officials.

The painstaking work can have big payoffs.

If authorities can identify a type of explosive, they can try to trace where it might have been purchased. 

As House Homeland Security Chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, noted, if the probe reveals the bomb was set off by a cellphone call, investigators can track all the calls made at exactly that moment.

Private and city surveillance cameras can show the color and density of the smoke plume -- details that can point to bomb size and ingredients.

Damage can tell a tale
To the trained eye, damage to the area and to the victims also yield important information. In Boston, pockmarks on the buildings pointed to a bomb packed with BBs. The gruesome injuries -- legs torn from bodies -- would indicate the bomb was close to the ground, experts say. The absence of widespread ear and lung injuries is associated with a low-explosive device.

Blood from the scene is also collected. The lab can later compare the samples to the victims' types to determine if there's a swab that has no match and could belong to a suspect.

If investigators are lucky, within 12 hours they will have enough fragments to pinpoint certain aspects of the bomb -- as has happened in the Boston case. The FBI then begins building a facsimile of the device.

Boston bombing investigators were working to identify the type of timer -- whether it was a cellphone alarm, for instance -- and verify other components and substances used.

The manpower required for such tasks is massive. A probe like the one in Boston could easily involve more than 100 people in forensic collection and analysis.

In Boston, the FBI has taken the lead. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms announced it was sending 30 specialists to the city. There will be experts in dental work, DNA, blood-pattern analysis and digital video analysis working the case. Local and out-of-town agencies devoted bomb squad and forensic personnel to the investigation.

Typically, 36 hours after a bombing the forensic teams will have collected and mapped what they can and will consider releasing the scene. The hope is that by then they will also have someone in custody or some idea of who it is they're hunting.

Richard Esposito is the author of “Bomb Squad: A Year Inside the Nation’s Most Exclusive Police Unit”.

Slideshow: Boston Marathon explosions

Charles Krupa / AP

See images from the scene of the explosions.

Launch slideshow

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This story was originally published on Wed Apr 17, 2013 3:39 AM EDT

Elise Amendola / AP

FBI Special Agent in Charge Richard DesLauriers, far right, speaks as Boston Mayor Thomas Menino, left, and Mass. Gov. Deval Patrick, center, listen during a news conference in Boston on Tuesday, April 16 regarding two bombs which exploded in the street near the finish line of the Boston Marathon on Monday, killing at least three people.

Authorities have yet to name any suspects in the pair of bombings that killed three people and injured more than 170 at the finish line of Monday's Boston Marathon. But having Richard DesLauriers, special agent-in-charge of the FBI's Boston field office, at the helm means whoever is behind the attack is up against someone with decades of experience in espionage, violent crime, and other security issues.

On Tuesday, DesLauriers vowed at a news conference, "We will go to the ends of the earth to find the suspects responsible for this despicable crime."

Leading the Boston Marathon bombing investigation may be one of the most tragic cases that DesLauriers' has handled. But the 26-year FBI veteran is no stranger to manhunts; not long ago he helped apprehend long-wanted gangster James "Whitey" Bulger.

DesLauriers has been with the FBI since 1987; his first assignment was working on cases related to violent crime and fugitives in the bureau's Birmingham, Ala., division. Before joining the FBI, he graduated magna cum laude from Assumption College in Worcester, Mass., in 1982, and got his law degree from The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., 1986. He's a Massachusetts native. 

Current FBI agents declined to comment about DesLauriers. But retired special agent Rick Hahn said DesLauriers must have proven himself exceptionally capable to have achieved his position in Boston.

"Boston is considered to be a preferred assignment," he said. "There's a lot of dynamics there in Boston that don't exist in places like Little Rock, Arkansas, example. A lot of government contracts, a lot of espionage, as well as their fair share of bread-and-butter type criminal activity."

DesLauriers spent 1990 to 1995 in the FBI's New York division working on counterintelligence matters, and then was promoted to supervisory special agent within the Eurasian Section of the National Security Branch at FBI Headquarters in Washington. Throughout the years, he advanced in the ranks and relocated to Boston. His title, "special agent," actually limits him in his abilities as a law enforcement officer, explained Hahn.

"It's a legal term," Hahn said. "A special agent means that you're only allowed to do certain things that are specifically outlined in your contract. The credentials of an FBI agent say that you're allowed to investigate crimes under federal statutes, you're able to collect evidence, preserve evidence, make arrests in federal cases. Those are the only things you can do. We can't collect taxes. There are other things that fall far outside our purview."

The special-agent-in-charge, of course, is a senior officer that can deploy staff to do just about anything he can't do himself.

In addition to closing the Bulger case in June 2011, when Top Ten Fugitive Whitey Bulger and his companion Catherine Greig were arrested in Santa Monica, Calif. -- 16 years after the search for the gangster-turned-FBI informant began -- DesLauriers's other high-profile assignment has been working the infamous 1990 art heist at Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in which two thieves posed as Boston police officers. While the $500 million theft happened before DesLauriers worked in the Boston office, the masterpieces -- which included work by Rembrandt and Degas -- still have yet to be recovered.

"We are totally focused right now on recovering the paintings and returning them to the Gardner Art Museum. There is a $5 million reward outstanding right now for return of the paintings," DesLauriers announced last month.

While the FBI now believes it has identified the criminals responsible, they still haven't been caught.

DesLauriers is married and has a son, according to the FBI.

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• Third bomb victim was Chinese student

Ronen Zilberman / AP file

The submarine USS Greeneville is escorted to the submarine base at Pearl Harbor, in February 2001. A high concentration of important military commands and facilities on the island mean there's a great deal of information in Hawaii that potential adversaries want to know.

Clandestine agents. Foreign spies. Intelligence. Hawaii is better known for sunbathing on the beach or surfing than high-stakes sleuthing.

But the case of a 59-year-old civilian defense contractor accused of giving military secrets to his much younger Chinese girlfriend is a reminder of the state's little-known identity as a prime target for espionage. A high concentration of important military commands means there's a great deal of information on the islands that potential adversaries want to know.

Case in point: Most of the FBI's resources in Hawaii are concentrated on counterintelligence — not drug trafficking or terrorism.

"One of the FBI's priorities in Hawaii is keeping America's secrets safe from agents of foreign powers," said Tom Simon, a special agent in Honolulu. "With the amount of military and classified material in Hawaii, it remains a top priority for the FBI."

It helps that the state, population 1.4 million, isn't a hotbed of violent crime. That allows agents to focus much of their efforts on thwarting spooks.

The case against Benjamin Bishop, a defense contractor working for the U.S. Pacific Command when he was arrested March 15, offers a glimpse of the information potential adversaries might be looking for.

Bishop knows U.S. secrets on countering weapons of mass destruction, nuclear deterrence and ballistic missile defense, according to a declaration filed in court by Maj. Gen. Anthony Crutchfield, the Pacific Command's chief of staff.

More recently, Bishop worked on cyber security and is familiar with how the U.S. would counter adversaries in electronic warfare, air combat, undersea warfare, energy security and cyberspace, the declaration says.

Investigators say Bishop gave his girlfriend — a 27-year-old graduate student he met at an international military conference in Hawaii— classified information on nuclear weapons, war plans and missile defense.

Bishop hasn't been charged with outright espionage, which the law defines as giving national security secrets to someone for the purpose of helping a foreign government or harming the United States. But he has been charged with two violations of the Espionage Act: communicating defense secrets to someone not entitled to receive it and unlawful retention of defense documents.

Prosecutors haven't said they believe the girlfriend is working for the Chinese government or that she's given anything she learned from Bishop to anyone else. But an FBI affidavit filed in support of the charges speculates she may have attended the military conference specifically to target people like Bishop who work with classified information.

Bishop has not yet entered a plea, but his lawyer says his client wouldn't do anything to harm the U.S. The attorney, Birney Bervar, says the case isn't about espionage but about two people in love.

History of espionage
Spying isn't new to Hawaii.

In the months before the attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, a Japanese vice consul in Honolulu spent much of his time monitoring and reporting back home on the comings and goings of the U.S. Navy. Takeo Yoshikawa is said to have favored the view of Pearl Harbor he would get at a tea house — still in business today as the Natsunoya restaurant — in a hilly neighborhood overlooking the naval base.

The Soviet Union kept an intelligence collecting ship off the coast of Oahu during the Cold War to monitor U.S. military communications, said Ralph Cossa, president of Pacific Forum Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Today, the FBI says countries from the Asia-Pacific region are the ones most likely to attempt to gather intelligence about U.S. military operations in Hawaii.

China would have the biggest interest, followed by Russia, Cossa said. North Korea would be interested but doesn't have as many resources.

Their targets? Pacific Command is the U.S. military's headquarters for the Asia-Pacific region. The Navy, Air Force, Army and Marine Corps also each have their own headquarters for the Pacific on Oahu. The National Security Agency keeps an intelligence center tucked away in central Oahu.

There's a major missile defense testing site on Kauai. A high-powered missile defense radar capable of tracking a baseball-sized object 2,500 miles away — called the Sea-Based X-band Radar — visits Pearl Harbor regularly.

These days, computer hacking and cyber espionage — the area Bishop was working in most recently — are major spying methods.

Eyes and ears are useful too, whether they belong to undercover agents or to businessmen, tourists and students who may share what they see with their governments.

Honolulu has nearly 1 million residents, and the state is a mecca for sun-seeking tourists from around the world. This makes Hawaii an easier place for intelligence gatherers to blend in than, say, remote parts of Wyoming where the U.S. keeps ballistic missiles.

Pressure to gather intelligence from the islands is likely growing as the Obama administration places a greater emphasis on the region with the military's "pivot" to the Pacific. Cossa said the policy "shines a big target" on Hawaii.

"I'm sure every intel guy in China has been told 'Get more details. What does it really mean?,'" said Cossa, who spent 26 years in the Air Force, including three tours at Pacific Command.

The reconnaissance goes both ways. On the other side of the Pacific Ocean, the U.S. is eager to gather its own intelligence on new ships, planes and other equipment China is adding to its military.

Cossa said allegations like those against Bishop make for flashy headlines but account for a small percentage of the spying going on.

Most of the espionage involves people trying to listen to phone conversations and hack into email and computers, he said. It's easier for people to steal information this way and it's harder to detect.

"Obviously if you're working with classified information in the military, in Hawaii, you should expect somebody is trying to listen, someone is trying to copy," Cossa said. 

Keith Srakocic / AP

Pittsburgh Police Chief Nate Harper, seen in May 2011.

PITTSBURGH - Former city police Chief Nate Harper will plead guilty to charges that he conspired to steal city police funds deposited into unauthorized police credit union accounts and failed to file federal tax returns from 2008 to 2011, his attorneys said Friday.

Harper's lawyers made the announcement at a news conference on a day of fast-moving developments in the federal investigation after prosecutors announced the grand jury indictment, Harper pleaded not guilty to the charges at an arraignment, and the judge said the former chief could remain free.

U.S. Attorney David Hickton called Harper's actions "the worst kind of public corruption," and said it was "a sad day" for authorities who had worked closely with the soft-spoken, generally well-liked and seemingly humble man on issues ranging from gang violence and security for the G-20 economic summit in 2009.

"This is puzzling and baffling behavior," Hickton said.

Later, Harper begged off appearing at the news conference at the last minute because he was "embarrassed and distraught," defense attorney Robert DelGreco said. The 36-year police veteran has lost 20 pounds since Mayor Luke Ravenstahl demanded his resignation Feb. 20 after meeting with the FBI about the investigation, Harper's attorneys said. 

But the former chief, who came up through the ranks of Pittsburgh's roughly 800-officer force and was chief since 2006, takes "full responsibility" for his actions, said Robert Leight, another Harper attorney.

"I think we're prepared to plead to that indictment without modification," DelGreco said.

The indictment alleges the 60-year-old Harper conspired with unnamed others to divert more than $70,000 from a city account into two unauthorized credit union accounts, then spent nearly $32,000 of that himself. It includes a single charge of conspiracy and four counts of willfully failing to file income tax returns.

Although the federal crimes carry a maximum combined penalty of nine years in prison, Harper's attorneys said guidelines dictate a likely sentence of 10 to 16 months - low enough for them to argue for probation or alternative incarceration, like house arrest.

Hickton wouldn't comment Friday on a likely sentence. He said the investigation is continuing, although he wouldn't say whether the mayor or other city personnel are targeted.

Ravenstahl denies any wrongdoing or being a target of the probe, although he's acknowledged two bodyguards, also city officers, used debit cards from the same credit union accounts. The 33-year-old mayor has decided not to run for re-election, citing the toll on his family from the scandal.

In statements Friday, Ravenstahl and interim police Chief Regina McDonald said the indictment against Harper was "sad." They said they are working to bolster confidence in the police bureau.

The investigation centers on a $3.85 hourly fee that bars, restaurants and other businesses pay the city when they hire off-duty officers to work security details. The money is collected on top of whatever hourly wage the officers are paid and, by law, must be kept in city-controlled accounts and spent only on certain types of police business.

Instead, Harper helped open the credit union accounts from which he spent $31,987 - mostly at restaurants, bars and department stores - using two Visa debit cards to make automatic teller machine withdrawals and purchases, Hickton said.

Harper's attorneys said the former chief was somewhat "naive" and may have believed at first that it was OK to open the unauthorized accounts because the money was still being spent on police-related business, including a massive Gatorade purchase to quench the thirst of officers brought in to handle the G-20 protests, for example.

At some point, however, Harper began spending the money on himself, which DelGreco said Harper understands was "unambiguously and indefensibly" wrong.

The attorneys hinted that Harper, who has three daughters and five grandchildren, exhausted his wages on his family and became tempted by the credit union funds.

"I think the lure of the unmonitored accessibility of that account proved to be an irresistible temptation," DelGreco said.

The attorneys said Harper didn't fail to file his tax returns to hide the money, but simply because of "procrastination" and "personal issues" that took precedence. Among other things, three city police officers were fatally gunned down in April 2009 - when the first of Harper's delinquent tax returns would have been due - and Harper never got back on track in handling his personal affairs, the attorneys said.

The indictment grew out of another federal investigation in which a former city employee has already pleaded guilty to taking $6,000 in bribes to help a business owned by a man Harper has described as a former friend land a $327,000 contract to install computers and radios in squad cars in 2007.

Harper continues to deny taking bribes or making money from that contract, Leight said. But as investigators poked into Harper's finances to see if he had any unexplained income from that scheme, Harper told investigators about money he stole from the police fees fund, Leight said.

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. 

The McMillian Campaign / Reuters

Marco McMillian, a candidate for mayor of the Mississippi Delta city of Clarksdale, is shown in this undated campaign photograph released to Reuters on Feb. 27, 2013.

The FBI said Thursday that it was monitoring the investigation into the killing of a black and openly gay mayoral candidate in Mississippi whose burned and beaten body was found on the Mississippi River levee outside town last week.

Marco McMillian, a candidate for mayor of Clarksdale, population about 20,000, was found dead last Wednesday. His family said he was beaten, dragged and set ablaze -- a death that "was not a random act of violence," they said in a statement. 

Authorities have arrested Lawrence Reed, who is also black, and charged him with murder in connection with the case. They say the killing is not being handled as a hate crime, though the FBI could determine whether to file a federal hate crime charge, which covers acts motivated by bias against sexual orientation, The Associated Press reported.

Mississippi’s hate crimes law does not cover acts motivated by sexual orientation.

After learning of the circumstances surrounding McMillian's death, special agents from the FBI's Jackson division made contact with the local sheriff's department and the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation last Friday.

"In this case, the FBI will continue its ongoing dialogue and sharing of information with the local and state agencies, and will continue to monitor this investigation for any indication that a potential violation of federal law exists," Daniel McMullen, special agent in charge of the FBI for Mississippi, said in a statement.

Related: Mayoral candidate's death shocks Mississippi town 

The candidate's sport-utility vehicle was involved in a head-on collision in Coahoma County in the Mississippi Delta early last week. Reed had been driving when the accident occurred, but McMillian was not in the vehicle, triggering a search for him, according to media reports.

McMillian had moved back home from Memphis in January to vie for office as a Democrat. He was one of the first viable openly gay candidates to run for office in Mississippi, according to the Victory Fund, a national organization that supports gay and lesbian candidates.

Friends said his sexual orientation was known and was not an issue, according to a local newspaper, The Clarion Ledger.

On Sunday, McMillian's family said in a statement his body was “beaten, dragged and burned,” indicating that he had been pulled behind a car. 

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

An FBI informant who has helped catch some of the world's most dangerous terrorists is coming out of witness protection to warn that a terrorist sheik in prison remains a significant threat to the U.S.

Emad Salem is urging the U.S. to keep the ailing 74-year-old sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, often known as the Blind Sheik, behind bars and to not transfer him, even as governments overseas continue to press for his release.

"He will kill Americans," said Salem. "He will kill anyone who disputes what he says with a fatwa."

Salem, a one-time Egyptian military officer, had warned officials about the looming 1993 World Trade Center bombing, but his warnings were ignored after a lie-detector test was inconclusive and he said he would never testify at any trial. 

After the bombing, Salem agreed to become an FBI informant and managed to become the sheik’s personal assistant and bodyguard. Salem was able to record the sheik ordering the killing of Americans during his time in Jersey City, N.J., and Brooklyn, N.Y. 

Salem was also able to link the sheik to the 1993 World Trade Center bombers. Six people were killed and more than 1,000 injured in that first attack.

Now Salem is concerned about the mounting pressure on the U.S. from Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi and other Mideastern government leaders to get Rahman out of American custody.

'A terrible price'
In one letter dated Feb. 26, 2008, the justice minister of Qatar relayed a request from Rahman's family asking U.S. officials to have him transferred back to the nation to serve the rest of his sentence. They said they wanted to be able to visit him more easily, according to the letter by Qatar Attorney General Dr. Ali Bin Fetais Al Marri.

More recently, on this 20th anniversary week of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, Rahman's sons wrote on their family website that "America will pay a terrible price" if he is not released soon.

"The rain begins with one drop. America should expect more violent reactions if it does not release the sheik," the sons wrote on the website.

Don Emmert / AFP, file

A 1993 photo shows Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, who is serving a life sentence in the U.S. for his role in terrorist attacks, including an explosion at the World Trade Center in 1993.

The sons pointed to the killing of U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens as an example of terrorists acting on behalf of the sheik. The terrorists in that attack are believed to have called themselves the “Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman Brigade” in honor of the Blind Sheik.

Read more from NBCNewYork.com

The family also pointed to the recent attack on a gas plant in Algeria where hostage takers demanded the sheik be set free or American hostages would be killed.

The sons said they were hopeful that Morsi would make progress in working to free the sheik next month or they will "review their options."

Experts said the sheik’s family was intensifying an already active campaign to both seek the sheik’s release and inflame passions among the sheik’s extremist followers.

Calls monitored
The sheik has also been able to call his relatives twice a month from his prison, NBC 4 New York has learned. Officials said the calls are monitored, and his relatives tell NBC News' Ayman Moyheldin that the calls are personal in nature and do not include calls for a violent jihad.

But in one posting on their website, Rahman's sons posted a political message they said was from the sheik. In that message, Rahman urged Egyptians to vote for Morsi in the recent presidential election "because he is the candidate who represents Islam and represents the revolution."

A Federal Bureau of Prisons spokesman declined to discuss the specifics of the sheik's phone privileges.

Rahman's lawyer, Lynne Stewart, was arrested in 2002 and later convicted for her role in sneaking out terror messages for the sheik in which he called for more attacks on Western tourists in Egypt after the Luxor massacre killed 58 people.

“When are we going to wake up and smell the coffee?” asked Salem. “This man is dangerous in prison. What will happen when he is out of prison?”

A Justice Department spokesman insisted the U.S. government will not be swayed by the appeals from Mideast leaders calling for Rahman's release. 

“The Blind Sheik will spend the rest of his life in a U.S. federal prison. Period,” said DOJ spokesman Dean Boyd.

Still, Rahman remains an inspiring figure for al-Qaida and radical jihadist figures across the globe. Salem said he was risking his life stepping forward because the sheik and his followers want him dead.

“They are seeking to get me killed to be a feather in their hat, that 'We killed the man who helped America,'” Salem said.

But he said not stepping forward to warn about the potential threat the sheik and his followers still pose could be an even greater danger.

A New York Police Department spokesman said there is no new specific threat to New York but intelligence officials are aware of the Rahman family website and the terror warnings posted there this week.

While security experts said the sheik does not have operational capability from prison, they agree that as long as he is alive in a U.S. prison he could serve as inspiration for extremists to act. 

“This guy -- 1990 or 2013 -- sadly, unfortunately, [is] still in charge of his followers,” Salem lamented.  “He is the 'Prince of Jihad’ and will continue to be.”

Related:

New York-area politicians condemn Egypt's new leader over bid to free terrorist