A third-grade Pakistani teacher at a Muslim school, the last of 11 members of the "Virginia jihad network" charged with aiding an anti-India terrorist group, was sentenced to 15 years in prison.
Arun Kumar
WASHINGTON: A third-grade Pakistani teacher at a Muslim school, the last of 11 members of the "Virginia jihad network" charged with aiding an anti-India terrorist group, was sentenced to 15 years in prison.
Prosecutors had sought a sentence of 30 years to life in prison for Ali Asad Chandia, 29, one of the 11 Muslim men charged in US District Court in Alexandria in June 2003 with training with and fighting for Lashkar-e-Taiba.
Chandia, they said, trained at a Lashkar camp in Pakistan and helped the group acquire paintballs and other equipment with potential military applications when he returned to the United States. The equipment included unmanned aerial vehicles, night-vision equipment and wireless video cameras.
Federal investigators also found a CD-ROM in Chandia's car containing videos that glorified Osama bin Laden and the 19 hijackers who carried out the Sep 11 attacks, prosecutors said.
District Judge Claude M. Hilton in Alexandria did not explain his reasoning as he imposed the sentence and ordered Chandia, who had been free on bond, into custody.
Earlier, Chandia, who teaches at a Muslim school in Maryland, had told the judge that he did not "deserve to spend a single day in prison." With his voice shaking and rising in anger, Chandia said: "With Allah as my witness, I tell everyone that I am innocent... God knows that I did not support and would not support any terrorists."
Chandia's sentencing wrapped up an investigation that has produced more guilty verdicts than any domestic terrorism case in US since the attacks of Sep 11, 2001.
Six of the 11 men pleaded guilty, three were convicted at trial and two were acquitted. The group's spiritual leader, Ali al-Timimi, was convicted last year on charges that included soliciting others to levy war against the United States and contributing services to Afghanistan's former Taliban rulers. He was sentenced to life in prison.
The Justice Department has hailed the case as key to the domestic campaign against terrorism, saying that its post-Sept 11 mandate is to prevent attacks.
A federal jury convicted Chandia in June of three counts of providing material support to Lashkar-e-Taiba or conspiring to do so and acquitted him on a fourth count of supporting terrorists.
The evidence at trial established that during a three-month trip to Pakistan in 2001-2002, Chandia met and allied himself with Mohammed Ajmal Khan, a British citizen of Pakistani descent.
Khan, who is currently serving a nine-year sentence in the United Kingdom for directing a terrorist organisation, served as a military procurement official for Lashkar-e-Taiba.
Chandia assisted Khan in procuring military-purpose equipment for Lashkar-e-Taiba for use in its violent jihad against India.
He gave safe harbour to Khan during Khan's visits to the United States in 2002 and 2003, and allowed Khan to use his home computer to pursue the acquisition of equipment such as unmanned aerial vehicles, night-vision equipment and wireless video cameras.
Khan also used the defendant's computer to confirm the purchase of $17,000 of Kevlar anti-ballistic material that Khan had purchased for Lashkar-e-Taiba.
In a search of Chandia's home conducted on May 8, 2003, the FBI found audiotapes and other materials manifesting his commitment to violent jihad.
On the front seat of Chandia's car, the FBI also found a CD-ROM containing videos glorifying the Sep 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Osama bin Laden and the 19 hijackers who carried out the attacks.
They also found a CD-ROM containing still photographs of persons jumping to their deaths from the World Trade Center towers.
"Terrorist organisations like Lashkar-e-Taiba rely on a network of individuals to carry out their deadly operations," US Attorney Rosenberg said after the sentencing.
"Ali Asad Chandia was a member of that network for Lashkar-e-Taiba, and he will now spend a very long period of time in prison for providing material support in furtherance of its violent agenda," he added.
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