Steven Houze, an attorney representing Maher Hawash, is surrounded by microphones as he talks with reporters outside the Mark O. Hatfield Federal Courthouse Tuesday in Portland. Federal authorities charged Hawash with plotting to aid al-Qaida and Taliban forces fighting U.S. soldiers a month after the 2001 terrorist attacks. Hawash, a 39-year-old software engineer, has been in custody as a material witness since late March. AP Photo

PORTLAND - Maher Hawash, a software engineer held without charges for more than a month as a material witness, appeared publicly in court for the first time Tuesday, while outside supporters said his case was an abuse of civil rights.

"Why was an American citizen who's loyal to his country held for five weeks under a veil of secrecy?" Hawash's attorney, Steven Houze, said on the courthouse steps after the hearing. "He's a nice, clean-cut fellow, a father of three children, a hard-working U.S. citizen."

Prosecutors painted Hawash differently. A 41-page affidavit unsealed Monday accuses the 39-year-old Palestinian immigrant of growing angry with America after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, then conspiring with at least five other Muslim men to join the fight in Afghanistan against U.S. troops.

Hawash accompanied the group as it tried and failed to enter Afghanistan from western China in late fall, 2001, according to court documents.

Houze described this evidence as "sketchy and circumstantial." Supporters have said Hawash, who goes by "Mike," traveled to China in late 2001 on business.

The affidavit contends Hawash stayed in the same hotels in China with his co-conspirators, members of the so called "Portland Six.".

In court Tuesday, Hawash more closely resembled the suburban computer programmer and family man that he became after immigrating in the early 1980s than the "jihad" warrior prosecutors portray him as.

Hawash, who previously sported a bushy beard, was clean shaven and dressed in a green tweed suit jacket.

He turned and smiled at his wife, Lisa Hawash, who sat on a wooden bench in the 14th floor courtroom in the Mark O. Hatfield building. Lisa Hawash left without talking to reporters.

Hawash stood as U.S. District Judge Robert E. Jones set a preliminary hearing for Monday at 9 a.m., to be followed by a bail hearing May 8.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Charles Gorder said a grand jury will convene Friday.

Kent Robertson, chief of criminal prosecutions at the U.S. Attorney's office in Portland, declined to say why his office chose to hold Hawash secretly as a material witness before seeking an indictment. Robertson said he could not discuss whether new evidence emerged during the five-week detention.

Jones has ruled the detention was legal, but had set a deadline of last Friday for Hawash to be brought before a grand jury or released. Prosecutors presented him to the grand jury Friday, Jones said.

Hawash's arrest came more than half a year after charges were filed against the six other Portland residents. The FBI appears to have begun investigating Hawash after receiving tips from some of his neighbors, according to the affadavit.

Outside the courthouse, 50 or so friends and former co-workers waived signs of support Tuesday.

Daniel Moss, a former design engineer at Intel, held a poster that read: "Mike, We believe in your innocence."

Moss said the public hearing didn't erase the fact that Hawash was held for five weeks in solitary confinement without being charged with a crime.

Karen Herrold, another former Intel colleague, said few can picture the soft-spoken engineer who came across as more nerdy than dangerous as a supporter of terrorism and volunteer "jihad" fighter.

"Most everybody who's worked with Mike doesn't believe in this," Herrold said. "He was a good engineer and good man."