Mohammed Salah, the only U.S. citizen to be designated an international terrorist, was acquitted Thursday of terrorism-related charges - a rejection of the federal government's claim that he helped lead the militant Palestinian group Hamas.
The dramatic conclusion of Salah's three-month trial capped a novel-worthy story 14 years in the making.
Salah was captured by Israeli authorities in 1993 and accused of serving as a Hamas military commander, and he’s been dealing with the aftershocks ever since.
Salah, 53, of Bridgeview, was convicted of lesser charges of obstruction of justice for lying about his alleged Hamas links in a 2000 lawsuit. But he brushed that aside and basked in the glow of beating the main charge of racketeering conspiracy, which could have landed him behind bars for the rest of his life.
Tears streaming down his face, he bear-hugged defense attorneys and vigorously shook hands with dozens of well-wishers and spectators.
Top officials of the FBI and U.S. attorney's offices in Chicago huddled quietly and watched the celebration unfold.
"We are not terrorists," Salah said afterward in the teeming courthouse lobby with his 8-year-old son Ibrahim perched on his shoulders. "We are a great people who are helping the United States. We just have to thank our lawyers and everyone else. I have to thank everyone who helped my family put food on the table."
Salah's co-defendant, former university professor Abdelhaleem Ashqar, of Virginia, also was acquitted of racketeering charges but convicted of obstruction of justice and criminal contempt.
The lesser charges against Ashqar stem from his refusal to testify about Hamas before a federal grand jury despite a grant of immunity.
Both men remain free on bond. They’re scheduled to be sentenced June 15. Defense attorneys said they plan on requesting probation for them.
The trial, which began in October, touched on the ancient blood feud between Arabs and Jews and immersed jurors in a world of shadowy Israeli intelligence agents, suicide bombings, illicit money-runners and shifty overseas operatives speaking in code.
"We've never prosecuted a case like this," First Assistant U.S. Attorney Gary Shapiro said after the verdict. "I don't know if there will ever be another case prosecuted in this district with facts like these."
In an indictment announced in 2004 by then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, Salah was accused of delivering laundered money to Hamas militants in the Occupied Territories and recruiting a pair of local men for terrorist training.
Ashqar faced allegations that he served as a behind-the-scenes Hamas strategist and communications link between operatives in the U.S. and abroad.
Hamas, which is dedicated to the eradication of Israel and the establishment of a Palestinian state, is considered a terrorist organization by the U.S. government. Salah and Ashqar, both natives of the Occupied Territories, were never directly tied to any violence, but they were accused of breaking U.S. laws to help Hamas.
The case against Salah was built around a series of incriminating statements he gave to agents of Israel’s Shin Bet security service after his capture at a military checkpoint in January 1993.
He was held without charges and interrogated over a period of nearly two months in Israel -- and defense attorneys repeatedly told jurors during the trial that Salah was tortured into saying what the Shin Bet wanted to hear.
A pair of Shin Bet agents involved in the interrogation, testifying under fake names in a courtroom cleared of the public, insisted that Salah’s confession was not coerced. But prosecutors admitted the Shin Bet in the early 1990s generally used harsh interrogation tactics considered by many human-rights observers to be torture.
The Salah prosecution drew the ire of civil rights activists and the Muslim community centered around the Bridgeview mosque where he has long worshipped.
Salah’s alleged work for Hamas took place well over a decade ago, and he ultimately spent nearly five years in an Israeli prison for it. A charge that Salah specifically supported terrorism was dismissed by prosecutors shortly before trial.
The racketeering charge alleged that Salah kept his 1990s-era Hamas status intact by lying in his written response to a 2000 lawsuit that was filed by the parents of a Jewish teen killed in a West Bank terrorist attack.
Critics have characterized the case alternately as a heavy-handed appeasement of Israel, a desperate bid to prosecute a terrorism case in the post-9/11 world, or both.
Ashqar defense attorney William Moffitt -- who compared his client to famous freedom fighters such as Nelson Mandela and Malcolm X -- told jurors there should be nothing illegal about resisting an armed occupation.
The long-running violence between Israelis and Palestinians, and who’s most to blame for it, was a constant theme throughout the trial. While prosecution witnesses testified about the horror of Hamas suicide bombings, defense witnesses said many more Palestinian civilians have been killed by Israeli soldiers in the conflict and described the deplorable living conditions in the Occupied Territories.
"Maybe the government will get it through its head that this conflict is not going to be settled in the criminal courts of the United States," Moffitt said.
Prosecutors praised the jurors, who deliberated for 14 days, for their hard work and said the fact that both defendants were convicted of something means the government didn’t lose the case.
"We believe that we proved our case beyond a reasonable doubt, the jury disagreed," Shapiro said. "We are still convinced of what we alleged in this case." After the verdict, jurors told the judge they didn't want to meet with reporters and issued a joint statement saying they based their verdict "solely on the facts as applied to the law."
Several jurors reached at home Thursday evening declined to comment. Hickory Hills resident Tahanee Hasan, whose father is a friend of Salah, said she has attended the trial since November.
A network of phone trees was set up to alert Salah's supporters that a verdict had been reached, and they began streaming toward the downtown Dirksen Federal Building after learning of it Thursday afternoon.
"Our entire community has been watching this," Hasan said.
As it was for much of the trial, the hallway outside U.S. District Judge Amy St. Eve's 12th-floor courtroom was packed with spectators hoping to snag a seat inside. Salah, who was allowed to await the verdict at home, warmly greeted the crowd when he arrived.
"You always have hope," he said quietly, hands spread, before entering the hushed courtroom to learn his fate.
A muted exclamation rose from the courtroom gallery when the "not guilty" verdict on the first count of the indictment was read. The mood became subdued when guilty verdicts on the remaining minor charges were read, but defense attorneys quickly declared victory after jurors filed out.
"This is a great day for justice," attorney Michael Deutsch said. "I think the jury rejected this idea that you can criminalize a political movement through (racketeering laws)."
Salah supporters swarmed the lobby of the courthouse for more than an hour after the verdict and were gradually herded outside.
Before heading home, Salah and about a dozen others arranged themselves in two rows - men in the first row, women in the second - and knelt on the snowy granite tarmac beside the federal building to pray.
"This case is not just for Muslims; it's for everyone," Salah shouted as the last few supporters and onlookers slipped away afterward. "We love you all."
No comments:
Post a Comment