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Civil rights lawyer Lynne Stewart sentenced to prison
Civil rights lawyer Lynne Stewart was sentenced Monday to 28 months in prison on a terrorism charge for helping a client who plotted to blow up New York City landmarks communicate with his followers, a sentence far less than 30 years prosecutors wanted.
Civil rights lawyer sentenced to prison
By LARRY NEUMEISTER, Associated Press Writer 27 minutes ago
NEW YORK - Civil rights lawyer Lynne Stewart was sentenced Monday to 28 months in prison on a terrorism charge for helping a client who plotted to blow up New York City landmarks communicate with his followers, a sentence far less than 30 years prosecutors wanted.
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Stewart, 67, smiled as the judge announced he would send her to prison for less than 2 1/2 years.
"If you send her to prison, she's going to die. It's as simple as that," defense lawyer Elizabeth Fink had told the judge before the sentence was pronounced.
Stewart, who was treated last year for breast cancer, was convicted in 2005 of providing material support to terrorists. She had released a statement by Omar Abdel-Rahman, a blind Egyptian sheik sentenced to life in prison after he was convicted in plots to blow up five New York landmarks and assassinate Egypt's president.
Prosecutors have called the case a major victory in the war on terrorism. They said Stewart and other defendants carried messages between the sheik and senior members of an Egyptian-based terrorist organization, helping spread Abdel-Rahman's call to kill those who did not subscribe to his extremist interpretation of Islamic law.
In a letter to the judge before her hearing, Stewart proclaimed: "I am not a traitor."
"The end of my career truly is like a sword in my side," She said in court Monday. "Permit me to live out the rest of my life productively, lovingly, righteously."
In a pre-sentence document, prosecutors told U.S. District Judge John G. Koeltl that Stewart's "egregious, flagrant abuse of her profession, abuse that amounted to material support to a terrorist group, deserves to be severely punished."
Stewart, in her letter to the judge, said she did not intentionally enter into any plot or conspiracy to aid a terrorist organization. She believes the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks made her behavior intolerable in the eyes of the government and gave it an excuse to make an example out of her.
"The government's characterization of me and what occurred is inaccurate and untrue," she wrote. "It takes unfair advantage of the climate of urgency and hysteria that followed 9/11 and that was relived during the trial. I did not intentionally enter into any plot or conspiracy to aid a terrorist organization."
Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Dember argued at her sentencing that the case had nothing to with Sept. 11.
"What she was doing was smuggling terrorism messages and smuggling out Abdel-Rahman's responses," Dember said.
About 150 Stewart supporters who could not get inside the capacity-filled courtroom stood outside the courthouse, chanting "Free Lynne, Free Lynne." Some 200 others jammed the hallways outside the courtroom.
"It's not just Lynn Stewart who is a victim, it's the Bill of Rights that's the victim," said Al Dorfman, 72, a retired lawyer who joined the crowd outside.
Stewart was arrested six months after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, along with Mohamed Yousry, an Arabic interpreter, and Ahmed Abdel Sattar, a U.S. postal worker. The indictment against them was brought by former Attorney General
John Ashcroft in 2002.
Koeltl sentenced Sattar to 24 years in prison. Convicted of conspiracy to kill and kidnap people in a foreign country, he could have been sentenced to life.
"I am not a violent person," Sattar said. "I am a human being. I am an America. I am a Muslim who practices and believes strongly in his religion."
Koeltl said he departed from the federal sentencing guidelines because no one was killed or injured as a result of the crimes and because of Sattar's lack of previous crimes and restrictive prison conditions.
By LARRY NEUMEISTER, Associated Press Writer 27 minutes ago
NEW YORK - Civil rights lawyer Lynne Stewart was sentenced Monday to 28 months in prison on a terrorism charge for helping a client who plotted to blow up New York City landmarks communicate with his followers, a sentence far less than 30 years prosecutors wanted.
ADVERTISEMENT
Stewart, 67, smiled as the judge announced he would send her to prison for less than 2 1/2 years.
"If you send her to prison, she's going to die. It's as simple as that," defense lawyer Elizabeth Fink had told the judge before the sentence was pronounced.
Stewart, who was treated last year for breast cancer, was convicted in 2005 of providing material support to terrorists. She had released a statement by Omar Abdel-Rahman, a blind Egyptian sheik sentenced to life in prison after he was convicted in plots to blow up five New York landmarks and assassinate Egypt's president.
Prosecutors have called the case a major victory in the war on terrorism. They said Stewart and other defendants carried messages between the sheik and senior members of an Egyptian-based terrorist organization, helping spread Abdel-Rahman's call to kill those who did not subscribe to his extremist interpretation of Islamic law.
In a letter to the judge before her hearing, Stewart proclaimed: "I am not a traitor."
"The end of my career truly is like a sword in my side," She said in court Monday. "Permit me to live out the rest of my life productively, lovingly, righteously."
In a pre-sentence document, prosecutors told U.S. District Judge John G. Koeltl that Stewart's "egregious, flagrant abuse of her profession, abuse that amounted to material support to a terrorist group, deserves to be severely punished."
Stewart, in her letter to the judge, said she did not intentionally enter into any plot or conspiracy to aid a terrorist organization. She believes the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks made her behavior intolerable in the eyes of the government and gave it an excuse to make an example out of her.
"The government's characterization of me and what occurred is inaccurate and untrue," she wrote. "It takes unfair advantage of the climate of urgency and hysteria that followed 9/11 and that was relived during the trial. I did not intentionally enter into any plot or conspiracy to aid a terrorist organization."
Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Dember argued at her sentencing that the case had nothing to with Sept. 11.
"What she was doing was smuggling terrorism messages and smuggling out Abdel-Rahman's responses," Dember said.
About 150 Stewart supporters who could not get inside the capacity-filled courtroom stood outside the courthouse, chanting "Free Lynne, Free Lynne." Some 200 others jammed the hallways outside the courtroom.
"It's not just Lynn Stewart who is a victim, it's the Bill of Rights that's the victim," said Al Dorfman, 72, a retired lawyer who joined the crowd outside.
Stewart was arrested six months after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, along with Mohamed Yousry, an Arabic interpreter, and Ahmed Abdel Sattar, a U.S. postal worker. The indictment against them was brought by former Attorney General
John Ashcroft in 2002.
Koeltl sentenced Sattar to 24 years in prison. Convicted of conspiracy to kill and kidnap people in a foreign country, he could have been sentenced to life.
"I am not a violent person," Sattar said. "I am a human being. I am an America. I am a Muslim who practices and believes strongly in his religion."
Koeltl said he departed from the federal sentencing guidelines because no one was killed or injured as a result of the crimes and because of Sattar's lack of previous crimes and restrictive prison conditions.
For more information:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061016/ap_on_...
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By JULIA PRESTON and MATTHEW SWEENEY
Published: October 16, 2006
Lynne F. Stewart, the firebrand lawyer who was charged as a terrorist for helping a client in prison on terrorism charges to communicate with his followers, was sentenced today to 28 months in federal prison, far less than the 30 years the government had sought.
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Louis Lanzano/Associated Press
Lynne Stewart entering Manhattan federal court today for her sentencing.
Related
Text: Superseding Indictment (U.S. v. Sattar, et al.)
Prosecutors had argued that Ms. Stewart repeatedly flouted the law to aid the violent designs of Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, who was sentenced to life in prison after he was convicted in plots to blow up five New York landmarks and assassinate Egypt’s president. Ms. Stewart represented him at his 1995 trial.
The government said she and two men convicted with her helped the sheik transmit messages to the group’s leaders in defiance of prison restrictions.
The Bush administration has touted Ms. Stewart’s conviction as a major counterterrorism achievement, and prosecutors had asked Judge John G. Koeltl of Federal District Court in Manhattan to sentence the 67-year-old lawyer to prison for what would essentially be the rest of her life.
But in his remarks, the judge demonstrated that he did not believe Ms. Stewart represented the threat the government described.
There was “no evidence that any victim was in fact harmed” by her actions, the judge said. He cited her 30-year career as a government-appointed lawyer to “the poor, the disadvantaged and the unpopular.”
“It is no exaggeration to say that Ms. Stewart performed a public service not only to her clients but to the nation,” he said, adding that she did not choose her cases to become wealthy.
Ms. Stewart will be released on bail, pending an appeal that her lawyers are expected to file on her behalf.
After the hearing, a beaming Ms. Stewart spoke outside the courtroom, where dozens of her supporters and reporters had been waiting for her.
“This is a great victory against an over-reaching government,” she said, holding a bouquet of flowers she had been handed.
“I do hope we will be vindicated on appeal,” she said.
During the hearing, the judge noted that as a result of her conviction 20 months ago, Ms. Stewart lost her license to practice law and is banned from having any contact with her former client.
“The occasion for the crimes to be repeated will be nil,” he said.
But in turning down her request for no prison time at all, the judge indicated that she was not without culpability in this case, pointing to what he called “an irreducible core of very severe criminal conduct.”
Another defendant, Mohamed Yousry, the Arabic translator who was convicted of helping Ms. Stewart smuggle Mr. Abdel Rahman’s messages out of prison, was sentenced to 20 months, even though the government had sought 20 years for him.
The third defendant, Ahmed Abdel Sattar, 47, a Staten Island postal worker, received the stiffest penalty, a 24-year sentence. He was convicted of negotiating with the militants by telephone. The government had asked that he be given a life term because he was convicted of conspiracy to kill and kidnap people in a foreign country.
The judge said he departed from the federal sentencing guidelines for Mr. Sattar because no one was killed or injured as a result of the crimes and because of Mr. Sattar’s lack of previous crimes and restrictive prison conditions.
"I am not a terrorist, your honor," Mr. Sattar told the judge before he was sentenced, The Associated Press said.
"I am not a violent person. I am a human being. I am an American. I am a Muslim who practices and believes strongly in his religion," Mr. Sattar said.
When Ms. Stewart, long an abrasive advocate of anti-government causes, arrived at the courthouse this morning, she was surrounded by supporters who cheered and applauded for her. Some of them held up a banner that read, “We love you Lynne, and all you stand for.”
Others chanted: "Free Lynne. Free Lynne."
As she entered the federal courthouse, Ms. Stewart shouted to them “I love you” and “I’m hanging in there.”
Her defense lawyer, Elizabeth Fink, said Ms. Stewart would not survive prison because of her health.
“If you send her to prison, she’s going to die. It’s as simple as that,” she said, according to The A.P.
Ms. Stewart recently recovered from breast cancer, but she said before her sentencing that she feared it would return in prison.
Ms. Stewart still denies that she acted to further any violent goals of the sheik. In documents they submitted to persuade Judge Koeltl to be lenient and give her no prison time, Ms. Stewart’s lawyers said their client is newly remorseful about “ill-advised” moves on behalf of the sheik.
“I still believe it was justifiable — but perhaps not in the way that I did it,” Ms. Stewart said in an interview with The New York Times before her sentencing. She was speaking of her actions in June 2000 to violate strict prison rules, known as special administrative measures, by publicizing a message from the sheik to his militant followers in Egypt.
In their sentencing motion, two assistant United States attorneys, Andrew Dember and Robin Baker, wrote that Ms. Stewart’s actions “should be offensive to those actually zealously defending criminal defendants within the bounds of the law.”
“Stewart’s criminal conduct, which lasted more than two years, was both extremely dangerous and devious,” they said.
There was never any question during the eight-month trial that Ms. Stewart had broken the rules by releasing the sheik’s statement, which said he no longer supported a cease-fire by his followers in Egypt.
Ms. Stewart admitted in the interview with The Times that she became too close to the sheik, insisting it was because of his deteriorating health and sanity after years in solitary confinement, not any affinity with his Islamic fundamentalism.
“I ignored any warning signs,” Ms. Stewart said. “I led with my heart instead of my head and thought it would be all right.”
Besides the material support conviction, Ms. Stewart also was convicted of defrauding the government and making false statements for breaking her promise to abide by special rules the government imposed on the sheik to prevent him from communicating with his followers.
Civil rights lawyer Lynn Stewart was sentenced today to 28 months in prison today in prison for enabling a former client and convicted terrorist to communicate with his followers. Stewart was convicted last year of providing material support to terrorists after she passed along a 2000 press release in which her former client, Omar Abdel-Rahman expressed an opinion about a cease fire by Islamic militants in Egypt. Stewart claimed that Abdel-Rahman had a constitutionally protected right to express his opinion, despite an order barring any contact between the blind, Egyptian sheik, and his followers. Stewart's arrest came six months after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. In addition to the material support conviction, the lawyer was also convicted of defrauding the government and making false statements by breaking a promise to keep Abdel-Rahman from communicating with his followers. Last year, Stewart was diagnosed with breast cancer. The court delayed sentencing so she could undergo treatment.