Background Info

United States Senator Carl Levin had a pie shoved in his face dur­ing a dis­cus­sion with mem­bers of the Big Rapids com­mu­nity at on Aug. 16.

Levin, a demo­c­ra­tic sen­a­tor from Michigan and Chairman of the Senate Committee on Armed Services, was in Big Rapids to speak to mem­bers of the Mecosta County Democratic Party from 7:30 to 8:30 a.m. at Peppers Café. He opened the floor to ques­tions and selected Big Rapids native and for­mer Ferris State stu­dent Max Kantar.

Kantar pro­ceeded to read from a pre­pared state­ment crit­i­ciz­ing the sen­a­tor for his stance on for­eign poli­cies regard­ing U.S. sup­port of Israel. During Kantar’s state­ment, Ahlam Mohsen, a 22-year-old woman from Coldwater, put an apple pie in Levin’s face. Mohsen and Kantar imme­di­ately fled the scene.

Mohsen was appre­hended shortly after the inci­dent. She is fac­ing felony charges for stalk­ing and con­spir­acy to com­mit aggra­vated stalk­ing fol­low­ing her arraign­ment on Aug. 17. Mohsen is being held at Mecosta County Jail where she must post $25,000 to be released. Her bond is set at $250,000 and her next court appear­ance is sched­uled for Aug. 30.

Kantar turned him­self in on Aug. 18 with help from attor­ney Jim Samuels and faces aggra­vated stalk­ing and con­spir­acy to com­mit aggra­vated stalk­ing charges, the same charges as Mohsen. Kantar’s bond was reduced from $250,000 to $10,000 dur­ing his arraign­ment Wednesday for his coop­er­a­tion with author­i­ties. Kantar will have to pay $1,000 to be released from Mecosta County Jail.

The charges against Kantar and Mohsen are stemmed from an inci­dent in January 2009 in which they were both arrested after an anti-war protest at Levin’s office in Lansing. Levin was in Washington D.C. at the time and they did not speak with him directly. The case is still under inves­ti­ga­tion and the Big Rapids Department of Public Safety turned it over to the FBI.

Levin said in a state­ment that he was not harmed in the inci­dent. The sen­a­tor also said that the only thing hurt by the event was their (Kantar and Mohsen’s) cause. n