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Edited on Wed May-05-10 08:49 PM by Liberal_in_LA
My news described the Times Square bomber as living the immigrant's dream - 29 years old, naturalized citizen, MBA, newly built house. The details say otherwise: in debt, couldn't afford to keep the house, junior position
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Car bomb suspect struggled to find a place Faisal Shahzad, a Pakistani immigrant who police say has admitted parking an SUV bomb in New York, piled up debts and made few friends in the U.S.
For most of the past decade, Pakistani immigrant Faisal Shahzad struggled to find his place in America, piling up debts and bouncing from one run-down neighborhood to another.
In 2004, he and his wife, Huma Mian, plunked down savings to take out a $218,400 mortgage for a two-story house in Shelton, a gritty Bridgeport suburb. The following year, Shahzad was awarded a master's of business administration degree from the University of Bridgeport, normally a ticket to a prosperous future
But unable to pay the mortgage or a $65,000 home equity loan, the couple abandoned their home to foreclosure last summer, putting broken furniture and old clothes up for sale. A heating oil company chased them for non-payment of bills.
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"He was always in white and wearing those funny sandals," said Debbie Bussolar, a dental technician who lived across the street. He wore a bushy beard for a while, she recalled, but trimmed it short.
Shahzad had landed a slot as a junior financial analyst in the Norwalk office of the Affinion Group, a marketing and consulting business, the company said. And his life seemed to improve.
In February 2009, he obtained a $65,000 home equity loan from Wachovia Bank. And on April 17, 2009, he became a U.S. citizen in a ceremony before a federal magistrate at the U.S. courthouse in Bridgeport.
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