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Sulaiman Abu Ghaith: Bin Laden's son-in-law convicted | |
(35 minutes later) | |
Osama Bin Laden's son-in-law Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, who served as al-Qaeda spokesman after 9/11, is found guilty of terrorism at his New York trial. | Osama Bin Laden's son-in-law Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, who served as al-Qaeda spokesman after 9/11, is found guilty of terrorism at his New York trial. |
He could face life in prison when he is sentenced in September on charges of conspiracy and aiding al-Qaeda. | |
The Kuwaiti clergyman was captured in Jordan last year and brought to New York for trial. | The Kuwaiti clergyman was captured in Jordan last year and brought to New York for trial. |
He is the highest-ranking al-Qaeda figure to face trial on US soil since the attacks. | He is the highest-ranking al-Qaeda figure to face trial on US soil since the attacks. |
The jury returned a guilty verdict on three charges: conspiracy to kill Americans, conspiring to provide support to al-Qaeda, and providing support to al-Qaeda. The verdict came after about five hours of deliberation. | |
Videos showing Abu Ghaith threatening America with no end to the "storm of airplanes'' were shown to jurors, but he argued his role was a purely religious one, aimed at encouraging all Muslims to rise up against their oppressors. | |
He testified that Bin Laden had asked him to be al-Qaeda's spokesman on the night of the 9/11 attacks. | He testified that Bin Laden had asked him to be al-Qaeda's spokesman on the night of the 9/11 attacks. |
On Monday, during closing arguments, Assistant US Attorney John Cronan highlighted what he said was the importance of Abu Ghaith's post-9/11 status. | |
"Going to that man was the very first thing Osama Bin Laden did on September 11 after the terror attacks," he said. "The defendant committed himself to al-Qaeda's conspiracy to kill Americans, and he worked to drive other people to that conspiracy." | |
Denying he was an al-Qaeda recruiter, Abu Ghaith insisted he had agreed to meet with Bin Laden in a cave on the night of September 11 out of respect for Bin Laden's standing as a sheikh. | |
One witness was a British man who was supposed to join Richard Reid in the attempted shoe-bomb airline attack of December 2001. He abandoned the plot during a trip home, after his parents warned him that he better not be a terrorist. | |
He did not know Abu Ghaith, but prosecutors introduced evidence to show Abu Ghaith knew there were detailed plans for more air attacks on the US, as he promised. | |
Abu Ghaith's defence lawyer, Stanley Cohen, argued there was "zero evidence" that the 48-year-old former teacher knew of the conspiracies and warned jurors not to let prosecutors "intimidate you and to frighten you into returning verdicts not based upon evidence, but fear". | |
Abu Ghaith is married to Bin Laden's eldest daughter Fatima. |