Urban Moving Systems operated out of a Weehawken warehouse for several years, nestled across the street from St. Lawrence Church. It seemed to be a legitimate moving business, owned and operated by Dominik Otto Suter, a resident of Fair Lawn.
However, the business’ operations took a bizarre turn after Sept. 11, when a Union City woman told the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) that she thought she saw three people videotaping the smoldering World Trade Center and apparently celebrating the attacks from atop an Urban Moving truck parked near the Doric Apartments in Union City.
Acting on the tip from the Union City woman, the FBI raided the warehouse, taking away several boxes of documents and computer hard drives.
Suter has since sold his home in Fair Lawn and moved back to Israel. The company’s five employees were deported in January by the federal Immigration and Naturalization Services (INS). However, the FBI said that this was unrelated to the terrorist attacks, and that there was no connection.
"The individuals were investigated thoroughly and were not found to have any connection with the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks or with any intelligence agencies," said Sandra Carroll, the spokeswoman for the FBI offices in Newark.
However, there were other problems that Urban Moving Systems encountered while conducting business in Weehawken.
According to Deputy Police Chief Robert DelPriore, the Weehawken police department received several complaints from all over the country from customers who had contracts with Urban Moving Systems but never had their goods properly moved.
"We never saw hide nor hair of them after Sept. 11," DelPriore said. "We had over 100 calls from people who never received their furniture and goods. Even before Sept. 11, we had calls from people who said that they were trying to extort more money from the customers to move their furniture. We had calls from California, Iowa, Ohio, Pennsylvania and North Carolina. These people wanted their furniture back and couldn’t get it."
DelPriore said that he referred all calls to the state Department of Consumer Affairs.
"Apparently, [the owner of the warehouse that the moving company used] had a private company come in and contact all the complainants," DelPriore said. "As long as they came with proof that would identify their items, they were able to claim them. It apparently went smoothly and the warehouse was emptied."
However, there are still some items that remain. The owner of the warehouse, who inherited the mess left by Suter when he left the country, has tried his best to return the items to their rightful owners.
"We got rid of all the items that could be identified," said the owner of the warehouse, who requested anonymity. "But we still have some items left."
The owner said that he will wait 40 more days to have the people claim their items, then will probably donate the rest of the remaining furniture to charity.
DelPriore said that he was led to believe all along that Urban Moving Systems was a legitimate business.
"We had no calls of anything going on there," DelPriore said. "Who knows what they could have been doing on the side? It all came to light after Sept. 11. They weren’t a danger to us or the community. You could never tell that they were involved in any other kind of activity."
Suter was charged with several counts of extortion and for passing bad checks, but since he has fled the country, he will probably never face those charges.
Urban Moving Systems also purchased a warehouse in Bayonne last August and deserted that location as well, owing more than $26,000 in property taxes.
"Let’s put it this way," DelPriore said. "We’re glad to see them go."
In a recent episode of "20/20" produced by ABC news, a reporter suggested that ABC had documentation that Suter was offering a front in the Weehawken warehouse for an apparent Israeli spy mission. In the ABC story, the FBI said the company had nothing to do with the terrorist attacks but would not comment on the spying allegations.