found guilty.
A federal judge found former Georgia Tech student Syed Haris Ahmed guilty Wednesday of conspiring to provide material support to terrorism in the United States and abroad.
Ahmed, 24, could face 15 years in prison. Sentencing has been deferred until after the August 3 trial of Ahmed’s alleged co-conspirator, Ehsanul Islam Sadequee, who is expected to face the same charges.
U.S. District Judge William Duffey announced his verdict in federal court in Atlanta. The judge scheduled a hearing Thursday to reveal his findings.
Ahmed has been held in solitary confinement at the U.S. Penitentiary in Atlanta since April 2006. The month before, he was arrested and indicted by a grand jury.
“We were expecting [the verdict], because that was what the system was supposed to do,” said Ahmed’s father, Syed Riaz Ahmed.
He went on to say that Ahmed did not do anything physically, but in the United States, if you think something, you are guilty. Syed Riaz Ahmed said he doesn’t believe that his son ever would have carried out illegal acts.
The father said his son was misled about his religious identity because of what he read on the Internet and added that he is “proud that [his son] is becoming a better Muslim than others and trying to get other people to follow in the footsteps of the prophet.”
Defense attorney Jack Martin said he was not “terribly surprised by the verdict. I always thought it was a close case. It could have gone either way.”
But he said the three years his client has spent in solitary confinement “is enough penalty for what he has done.”
“Haris Ahmed never posed a threat to anybody. He never was involved in any serious plot or plan, never placed this country in any danger,” Martin said. “I look at his face and don’t see a terrorist.” (Source: Ex-Georgia Tech student convicted on terrorism charge – CNN)
Thankfully the judge saw through the charade presented by this guy and his defense attorney.
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