Malcolm X daughter held on warrants in North Carolina

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MARS HILL, North Carolina (AP) — The daughter of slain civil rights leader Malcolm X was being held in a North Carolina jail and could be extradited to New York to face charges on several outstanding warrants, authorities said Monday.

Malikah Shabazz was arrested Friday night after authorities responded to a call to a Mars Hill home, said Chief Deputy Michael Garrison of the Madison County Sheriff’s Office. Investigators found that the 45-year-old had several outstanding warrants from Queens, New York, that include charges for grand larceny, forgery and identity theft.

Garrison and her lawyer, Sean Devereux, said Shabazz is the daughter of Malcolm X, who was also known as El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz. She was born months after Malcolm X was assassinated exactly 46 years ago Monday.

Shabazz is scheduled to appear for an extradition hearing Tuesday.

Devereux said the warrants appear to be from 2009 but that she was never served with the papers. Her attorneys are not sure about the circumstances of the charges. He said prosecutors in New York have known her most recent address in South Carolina, where she owned a home and had a driver’s license.

“The notion that she fled New York is really not the case,” Devereux said.

Devereux said Shabazz is not fighting extradition and is eager to go to New York and deal with the matter. She’s mostly concerned about her 13-year-old daughter, who was in the custody of the local Department of Social Services, Devereux said.

Shabazz is being held at a jail in neighboring Haywood County because Madison County does not have facilities to hold women.

Devereux said she recently moved to the mountains of North Carolina to find a peaceful place to live. Authorities came to the house Friday night as social workers investigated a call that a child was not attending school, he said, noting that Shabazz’s daughter is home-schooled.

Shabazz is not facing charges in North Carolina, Garrison said.

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press.