Sept 11 relatives demand long sentence for accused (in Germany)

Reuters ^ | 12/4/04

[areafiftyone]

HAMBURG, Germany, Dec 4 (Reuters) - Relatives of September 11 victims demanded on Thursday the maximum 15-year jail sentence for a Moroccan on trial in a German court for helping the suicide hijackers and for belonging to an al Qaeda cell.

Five relatives spoke on behalf of 25 co-plaintiffs in the trial of Abdelghani Mzoudi, charged with several thousand counts of aiding and abetting murder, and membership of a terrorist organisation, the Hamburg cell at the centre of the attack plot.

In several hours of moving testimony, the relatives told of their pain. Debra Burlingame, whose brother was the pilot on the plane the attackers crashed into the Pentagon, called for the Hamburg court to hand the student a 15-year sentence.

"The men who murdered my brother didn't know him. For them he was just a means to an end. He always wanted to do the right thing and he was slaughtered like an animal," she told the court, her voice choked with tears.

"In the name of my brother, his crew and the passengers on board the plane, I humbly ask for justice."

Mzoudi, a 30-year-old electrical engineering student, sat motionless with his head bowed as he listened to the testimony.

Joan Molinaro, the mother of a fireman who died trying to save lives at the World Trade Center, described al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden as "the great Satan".

She said her son became a hero for the world on September 11, adding: "He was always our hero."

Mzoudi is accused of handling money for a plotter, attending an al Qaeda camp in Afghanistan in 2000 and covering up for other members of the Hamburg cell while they were in Afghanistan or taking flying lessons in the United States.

Mzoudi has not replied to the charges in court. His lawyers say he did little more than help fellow Muslims, and his paying of bills for a friend had nothing to do with the hijack plot.

The Hamburg court had wanted to wrap up the trial by Christmas but Judge Klaus Ruehle said last week he would have to wait for the German government to decide whether to hand over U.S. records of the interrogation of an al Qaeda leader.

The U.S. government has made available to Germany transcripts of the interrogation of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of September 11, to help investigations against Islamic extremists but not to be used in ongoing trials.

Germany has said in the past it would not allow similar interrogation records to be used in court proceedings.

The trial will resume next Thursday.

[theDentist]

And how about a rope at the end of that sentence?

[areafiftyone]

I can't believe the max is 15 years. But then again what am I thinking? This is EuroWeenie country!

[areafiftyone]

Okay I must be going nuts but did Free Republic just change its format? It looks strange to me or do I need some meds?

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

FR is in a different font than usual on my computer. I have no idea why.

[Michael81Dus]

Consider what he (probably) has done! He didn´t point the weapon on anyone of us. He was "helping" those who committed the crimes, and he belongs to a terror cell. That´s all what he did. He didn´t kill anyone, he "just" helped those who did. I think that 15 years are a reasonable punishment, keeping in mind that life usually ends after 80 years.

[Michael81Dus]

Looks like Jim has made some changes...
I don´t like this format, but my vote doesn´t count.

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

Unfortunately, this is Germany that we're talking about. They'll probably give the guy probation and a small fine. The German govt. will probably buy the guy a house.

[areafiftyone]

Oh good at least it's not just my puter.

[Smile-n-Win]

He didn´t kill anyone, he "just" helped those who did.

Quotation marks are right. "Just" helping murderers is just as bad as murder. This man absolutely deserves to die.

[Michael81Dus]

There´s a difference between pulling the trigger/flying the plane and standing at the side and shouting "do it!". While the first indeed committ the murder, the second supported his actions to a less extent than the actual killer. The second shouldn´t be punished the same.
The question why a state takes the right to kill people, can remain unanswered here. The only reason I know for capital punishment is that emotions calm down when the killer is dead, nothing more and nothing less. Not a christian attitude, I experienced by myself, when I supported the death for the snipers.

[Michael81Dus]

If convicted, he´ll probably be for 10 years in jail. That´s the minimum time for people convicted for 15 years. They can be released on probation after 2/3 of their time.

Btw, the German President has just pardoned an Red-Army-Group-terrorist (you remember, the 70´s, kidnapping and killing of the employers-union-chief?) after 24 years in prison. He should have stayed there. This guy was/is one of the worst.

[putupon]

I think that 15 years are a reasonable punishment,

(8760 hours in a year x 15 years)/3000 dead= 43.8 hours per death.

Life is cheap.

[Polybius]

Consider what he (probably) has done! He didn´t point the weapon on anyone of us. He was "helping" those who committed the crimes, and he belongs to a terror cell. That´s all what he did. He didn´t kill anyone, he "just" helped those who did. I think that 15 years are a reasonable punishment, keeping in mind that life usually ends after 80 years.

During World War II, the individual below did not point a weapon at anybody either. He did not personally kill anybody. He just "helped" others realize that they should commit such crimes. That´s all he did.

As far as I know, Osama bin Ladin has never personally killed an American either.

Do you actually believe that only the man who pulls the trigger has the accountability for murder?

Do you actually believe that spending 15 years in prison, from age 30 to age 45, is a just sentence for aiding in the murder of 3,000 individuals? As putupon calculated, that comes out to less than 44 hours in prison for per each human life taken.

In the 1940's, Germans had so little regard for human life that 40 million Europeans died. Now, Germans believe that human life is so precious that a terrorist planner should only lose 15 years of it even if he helps murder 3,000 individuals.

The Europeans might say that Americans are "provincial". However, it is very hard for America to have much respect for such extreme manic depressive swings in European moral values.

[Smile-n-Win]

John, you should read #14! It is the most perfect response I ever saw posted on Free Republic.

[JohnHuang2]

Indeed -- re: #14 is excellent.

[Michael81Dus]

In Germany, we make a difference between killing someone, encouraging someone to kill (like giving money or sth else) and helping someone to kill another. While we punish the first two groups of people with life imprisonment, those who help the offender but actually do not pull the trigger themselves (like the car driver on a run after a bank robbery) can get a 15 year term in prison. This is justified because they were not the leading figures in the crime, unlike the encouraging person and the offender himself.

In fact it´s our belief that restrictions on freedom must be considered very good and limited only to necessary terms. This guy didn´t want to committ the crime by himself, so we need to "reward" him for having been too shy to do it. If he would get the same sentence like the offender and the encourager, what else would prevent others from pulling the trigger next time too? We need to make that distinction.

And punishment in Germany follows two aims: preventing him from doing it again/integrate him into society and punish him for his crimes. Apparently, unlike you, my country believes in the New Testament (love your enemies). We don´t need to take it litterally. We can forgive, and we don´t believe that a state has the right to kill except in self-defense (war). The saying "eye for an eye" doesn´t work - just look at Israel/Palestine. The last judgment is up to God, not to us!

This is my country, and if anybody, I have a right to decide wether the sentence he may face is just or not (via my vote to parliament which can change the penal code). I´m not talking about your death penalty, so you should respect the sovereignty of my nation. If you don´t like it, call your government officials to request an extradiction of this guy.

[Michael81Dus]

So you´d like to fry him 3000 times? Oh, logical thinking is hard!

His fine is not counted via the deaths others intentionally have caused. His fine is calculated on his actual actions. What has he done? He has prepared the flights of the others, what else?

I get sick and tired of this "buhuhu - the Germans should kill them all!" This is really annoying! Wake up and realize that you can´t take revenge on the 9-11-hijackers. They´re dead.

[Smile-n-Win]

That's what I was talking about the other day. Germans are making the same mistakes they made in the 1930s, only under a different label. Then, it was "Kill all the Jews!" Now it is, "Don't kill the bad guys!"

Can't you see that both slogans are expressions of the same idea?

[putupon]

They can be released on probation after 2/3 of their time

Of course I didn't factor in that discount; it actually comes up to 29.2 hr.s per death, no charge for the buildings and infrastructure, that's on the house.

Euro's have audacity to lecture us on the value of life? Puh-leeze!

So you´d like to fry him 3000 times?

Of course I would, but that's impossible, once would be the best we could hope for.

He has prepared the flights of the others, what else?

He was part of the organization that prepared the flights of 3000 people to the Afterlife.

Wake up and realize that you can´t take revenge on the 9-11-hijackers. They´re dead.

Yeah they're all dead alright, Mullah Omar, Bin Laden, and numerous underlings were still on the loose last I heard,.

. And after WTC 1 they were all in jail. And after the Munich Olympics. And after the African embassy bombings, there would be no more. And after the USS Cole, and after whatever happened on the train in Russia yesterday, and....

I'm sorry my European friend, in my arrogant American barbaric, uncultured, unenlightened opinion, I don't think that I'm the one who's sleeping.