US police 'question alleged anti-Islamic filmaker'

The alleged maker of a provocative anti-Islamic movie that has sparking violence across the Muslim world was taken early Saturday for questioning to a police station, local television reported. The local NBC News affiliate said Nakoula Besseley Nakoula was escorted by sheriff's deputies from his Cerritos, California, home shortly after midnight for an interview by federal probation officers. The report said the man emerged wearing a coat, hat, scarf and glasses. Officials said the federal officers wanted to find out whether Nakoula had violated any federal probation. In February 2009 Nakoula was charged in an alleged bank fraud conspiracy, the report said. The indictment accused him and others of fraudulently obtaining the identities and Social Security numbers of customers at several Wells Fargo branches in California and withdrawing $860 from them. Nakoula also served a year in jail after pleading guilty to possession of meth with the intent to manufacture in 1997, NBC News said. Local police said Nakoula had agreed to the interview prior to the deputies arriving at his home and that the move was "entirely voluntary," the report pointed out. The film depicting the Prophet Mohammed as a thuggish deviant offended many Muslims, and sparked a wave of anti-American protests that have cost several lives and seen US missions, schools and businesses set on fire. At least six protesters died in Egypt, Tunisia, Lebanon and Sudan on Friday as police battled to defend American missions from mobs of stone-throwers, and Washington deployed US Marines to protect its embassies in Libya and Yemen.