Posted on 12/22/2004 3:19:35 PM PST by Straight Vermonter
DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania (AP) -- A High Court judge on Wednesday found a Tanzanian businessman innocent of conspiracy to commit murder in the 1998 bombing of the U.S. Embassy in the East African nation.
Judge Emilian Mushi ordered the immediate release of Rashid Saleh Hemed, 34, who was charged in connection with the terror attack that killed 12 people and was blamed on Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network.
A nearly simultaneous blast at the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi, the capital of neighboring Kenya, killed 219 people, including 12 Americans.
"You cannot convict someone with doubtful evidence," Mushi told the court, after declaring that prosecutors failed to prove beyond doubt that Hemed was involved in the plot to bomb the embassy.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
TROP Judge....TROP Justice?
My guess is that the trial was on the level. The Tanzanians were not amused by the embassy bombing which killed primarily Tanzanians.
This is why the WOT can't be fought in the courts.
The Dems keep telling us terrorism is a law enforcement problem. They may be right. It seems like enforcement of the law is the problem.
As we all remember President Clinton immediately responded to those attacks with overwhelming force that terrified terrorists all over the world so they would never think of attacking American targets ever again. /major sarcasm
The only thing that can be won in the courts is: Judeo-Christian disenfranchisement.
Hemed, who was arrested shortly after the attack on August 7, 1998, testified in his defence that he came to know about the bombing after it had happened.Yahoo! News
He told the court he had voluntarily presented himself to police after he learnt he was being sought.
"I could have fled the country if I was guilty," he said.
But Hemed admitted that he knew other suspects in the bombing of the US embassy in Dar es Salaam, which left 11 people dead.
Almost simultaneously, another bomb went off outside the US embassy in Nairobi, killing 213 people, including 12 Americans, and injuring 5,000 others.
In October 2001, a New York court sentenced four al-Qaeda members to life imprisonment for their involvement in the bombings, having them extradited to the United States to stand trial.
According to US experts, the two east African embassies had been easy targets because they were among the least secure of the 260 US embassies and consulates around the world.
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