quote:A federal jury decided today to spare the life of Zacarias Moussaoui, sentencing the avowed al-Qaeda conspirator to life in prison for his role in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist plot.
The verdict was reached after seven days of deliberations following a two-phase death penalty trial that lasted six weeks.
The jury of nine men and three women began deliberating April 24 to determine whether Moussaoui, 37, a member of the al-Qaeda network headed by Osama bin Laden, would get the death penalty or life imprisonment for his role in the Sept. 11 plot.
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Do you really think he'll survive jail? As much as he has spouted about hating all Americans, I give it less than a year before he would be dead in there.
Posts: 9538 | Registered: Aug 2003
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Why do they specify 'nine men and three women'? It doesn't seem like very important information. Also, I thought it was the judge who would give out the sentence, and the jury only decides guilt?
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A death sentence has to be decided by a jury, I believe -- just one person can't make that decision. Dagonee can probably clarify that
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Let's hope that the prison system decides to keep him alive. Prisons can and do protect prisoners from violence when they choose to do so. I think that the last thing the US needs right now, is a high profile prison killing.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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quote:Why do they specify 'nine men and three women'? It doesn't seem like very important information. Also, I thought it was the judge who would give out the sentence, and the jury only decides guilt?
The death penalty requires aggravating circumstances to be found beyond a reasonable doubt by a jury. Even after that, a judge can alter the sentence to life.
Several states have jury sentencing. In Virginia, juries decide sentences after a second, brief "sentencing phase." The judge can reduce the sentence but not increase it.
As for him surviving prison, he'll probably be in protective custody. 23 hours in a cell, no contact with prisoners.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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Ouch. 23 hours a day without seeing anyone? I seem to recall the Amnesty recently condemned Norway for that practice; torture, they called it. Not that I have a lot of sympathy for the guy; he hates Americans so much, fine, he can live without 'em.
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I also have to add, however, that I would've been disappointed if the jury had decided in favor of giving him the death penalty.
I don't know that "living with the results" would've exactly captured my mood had it worked out that way.
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Dag (or anyone else who knows), what kinds of recreational options does a person in solitary confinement have? Do they have access to books, writing materials, and so forth? Can they request time with priests, imams, or whathaveyou? Psychologists? Additionally, if someone is in prison for life, with no chance of parole, is any effort made to rehabilitate them?
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I'm not sure about most of that. They definitely have access to clergy (or equivalent).
The federal prison system officially does not have the goal of rehabilitation; that's left for probation.
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I wouldn't want him to even have tv. Why? But then, I was pulling for capital punishment on this one. Oh well, life goes on.
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Historically, when "tough on crime" folk have succeeded in getting TVs removed from prisons the guards have organized to get them back. TV is a pacifier.
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Since it was never entirely clear to me that he didn't want to die, I don't know that death would have been a just sentence even if you believe in the death penalty.
And yes, everything I heard leading up to the case suggested life imprisonment for Moussaoui would be in solitary.
Now, to deny someone in solitary any form of sensory stimulation would fit into my personal definition of cruel and unusual punishment. The mind feeds on itself in such circumstances; death might be more merciful.
Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005
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I think it's a good think he was not condamned to death, because else, he will become a marthyr for islamist. The jugement is wise.
Just for information, i read that his mother asked to french authority to have Zacarias Moussaoui in a French prison.
Posts: 1189 | Registered: Dec 2004
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quote:Originally posted by dkw: Historically, when "tough on crime" folk have succeeded in getting TVs removed from prisons the guards have organized to get them back. TV is a pacifier.
quote:But if he's killed in prison, by other prisoners, then he's not been martyred on the horns of the Great American Satan.
Seems like a win/win situation.
Except that he'd be dead - that could be hardly called a "win" for anyone. It seems to me that whenever you are talking about sacrificing a life, you have already reached a lose/lose situation.
Posts: 2432 | Registered: Feb 2001
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quote:Originally posted by dkw: Historically, when "tough on crime" folk have succeeded in getting TVs removed from prisons the guards have organized to get them back. TV is a pacifier.
Cigarettes, too.
Anything to help them forget they can make shankers with their bed springs or a combination of fire and rolled up magazines.
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I think condemning him to death would have reinforced the rest of the world's beliefs that Americans are barbaric because we have the death penalty.
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Yes, even though many of you may be surprised at this (knowing some of my political stances) but I'm also glad he did not get the death penalty.
Just because I would have seen it as a breakdown in our justice system in a way.
I mean, Moussaoui wanted to kill Americans, really really wanted to. Still does. Planned to, and everything. But he himself actually didn't kill any (except by not telling about others who were going to do that, I agree). But he didn't physically himself kill anyone, and so personally I would have had problems with him getting death penalty.
Even though I know the law on guilt-by-association and all of that. I realized that. But in my book, the ones that deserve to die for what happened, DID die, as they did it.
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I just hope he is forgotten in prison and we don't have constant headlines about him. I can see in a few months news outlets giving wall to wall coverage on all the abuses, true or not, that he claims happened to him in prison.
Posts: 1918 | Registered: Mar 2005
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quote:It's not the death penalty, but convicted al-Qaeda conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui will soon face a punishment that some consider even worse: up to 23 hours a day in a soundproof, concrete cell, cut off from contact with anyone other than his guards and, perhaps, the lawyers who helped save him from execution. Moussaoui is expected to be transferred within days to the Administrative Maximum United States Penitentiary, or Admax, in Florence, Colo., the federal government's most secure prison, located in the high desert 90 miles south of Denver.
Dubbed the "Alcatraz of the Rockies" by prison experts -- and "The Tombs" by many prisoners and their lawyers -- the 12-year-old "supermax" facility houses about 400 of the most dangerous and infamous prisoners in the federal system, from "Unabomber" Theodore J. Kaczynski to Ramzi Yousef, architect of the 1993 World Trade center bombing. After the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the U.S. Bureau of Prisons transferred most, if not all, of its terrorism-related inmates to the prison.
But Moussaoui is unlikely to meet, or even glimpse, Yousef or any other fellow jihadists at the Florence facility anytime soon, according to federal officials, lawyers and others familiar with operations there.
In the most tightly monitored part of the facility, known as the "control unit," inmates are kept in segregation at all times -- living, sleeping and eating in individual cells poured from concrete that measure approximately 7 feet by 11 feet. They are designed to ensure that inmates cannot speak to or make eye contact with each other, according to defense lawyers, human rights advocates and others who have had access to the facility. Some prisoners are monitored 24 hours a day by surveillance cameras in their cells, as Moussaoui has been during his years in the Alexandria jail.
Most of the facility's cells are outfitted with small black-and-white televisions with a limited number of channels. It is unclear whether Moussaoui will be allowed to watch one.
Some inmates are allowed a handful of visitors and phone calls each month, but many of those incarcerated for terrorism-related crimes have no visitors other than their attorneys and the guards who shackle them whenever they are removed from their cells, according to defense attorneys and court testimony.
He's not getting off lightly.
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^^ I'd probably trade the TV for a decent selection of books. I wonder if they are allowed to watch the Crime channel.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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I don't have a link handy, but our local paper talked a bit about the SuperMax prison yesterday. Those limited number of channels broadcast mostly anger management and parenting classes, and to a lesser extent religious services and I think it said literacy classes. The desk and stool are also made of poured concrete, and the shower head is in the ceiling and the drain in the floor. Both the shower and the toilet have automatic shut-off valves so the drains can't be plugged and flood the cell. I don't remember if the bed is also concrete, but it doesn't have springs to make shanks out of.
He will be safe from other prisoners, the world will be safe from him, and he will quietly slip into obscurity.
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It may be perceived as weakness, but it is strength. Weak people can kill; only a strong people can afford mercy.
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Plus, locking him away in a hole and then forgetting about him is probably the best thing we could have done in terms of outcome.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
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People don't tell stories of heroic martyrs spending 50 years in jail and dying in obscurity.
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As long as he stays in obscurity, I have a bigger fear of him claiming to be tortured and the press dutifully running that as their top story for weeks and weeks
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BB: Actually, yeah they do. Otherwise there wouldn't be all those acts of terror aimed at getting them freed.
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By dont tell stories I mean "They don't become icons" yes daring prison breaks and rescuing people from Jail make compelling stories, but nobody tells their kids about "The amazing revolutionary that was jailed by the government and died alone in his cell 50 years later."
If by some sort of providence he gets out then yes its an AMAZING story but not otherwise.
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quote:Originally posted by DarkKnight: As long as he stays in obscurity, I have a bigger fear of him claiming to be tortured and the press dutifully running that as their top story for weeks and weeks
Sad that these kinds of claims are so credible these days.
Posts: 11187 | Registered: Sep 2005
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I think there's a lot less chance of stories of torture being credible at this prison than, say, at Gitmo. (Why no, I can't spell it.) He's isolated from everyone, including his guards, and there will probably be a security camera trained on him 24 hours a day. If he claims torture, they can run the tapes for journalists. *shrug* This one I think is a non-issue.
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I know, I just remember when, for most of the world - and for us, the idea that we would torture a prisoner was unthinkable. That is no longer true.
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Really? when was that? We have always tortured or beaten or allowed rape to many people throughout our entire history. The idea is much more popular now because 'everyone' hates Bush, and 'everyone' knows he wants to torture every Muslim that we can get our hands on
Posts: 1918 | Registered: Mar 2005
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Unless he IS tortured and then they just refuse to release the tapes on the grounds that it will hurt the War on Terror. They've done (or tried to do) that before.
The saddest thing isn't really that the claims of torture is credible. The truly sad thing is that some claims or torture have apparently been true.
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So in the entire history of the US we have never tortured before Gitmo?!!? We were all perfect beings never allowing any prisoners to come to harm until evil Bush took office and made all of our soldiers violently maim and cruelly torture the innocent prisoners who should have received a fair and just trial?
Posts: 1918 | Registered: Mar 2005
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Actually, I was referring to Abu Ghraib, but Gitmo has certainly hurt our moral standing as well. That we have to clarify which group of tortured prisoners also makes me sad and ashamed.
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