Should Moussaoui Get The Death Penalty?

[Lux]

9/11 penalty trial opens

Al-Qaida member pleaded guilty and now faces a death sentence.

ALEXANDRIA, Va. - If Zacarias Moussaoui had told arrest agents the truth about al-Qaida's plot to seize and crash U.S. jetliners, the FBI could have swiftly identified most of the Sept. 11 hijackers and contained the "cold-blooded slaughter" of nearly 3,000 people, a federal prosecutor told a jury Monday.


The Federal Aviation Administration would have put 11 of the 19 hijackers' names on a "no-fly list" and barred passengers from carrying small knives or box cutters aboard, prosecutor Robert Spencer said in his opening statement at Moussaoui's long-anticipated sentencing trial. Moussaoui, 37, a Frenchman of Moroccan descent who was arrested in Minnesota 25 days before the attacks, should be sentenced to death because his "lies killed the September 11th victims as surely as if he had been at the controls of one of the four planes," Spencer said in an impassioned voice.

But Edward MacMahon, a court-appointed defense lawyer, dismissed Spencer's declarations as "a dream ... that we all wish to come true."

He said the government failed to connect the dots from numerous leads about the 2001 al-Qaida plot, and prosecutors have never presented any evidence that Moussaoui knew details of the Sept. 11 plot anyway, let alone what his al-Qaida assignment actually was.

"No one should be executed on such flimsy evidence - not even an admitted al-Qaida member," MacMahon said.

Calling Moussaoui "the ultimate test of our criminal justice system," he said that everyone in America is entitled to a fair trial, even "the most despicable person who is charged with the most heinous crimes." Moussaoui entered a stunning guilty plea last April to six counts charging he joined in an al-Qaida plot to seize and crash U.S. aircraft, but he has denied knowing details of the Sept. 11 plot.

http://www.sacbee.com/content/news/courts_legal/story/14226683p-15050646c.html

[apostle]

Evidence is the only thing that counts. If there isn't enough of it for the death penalty then obviously one could not vote in favor of it. Passion for wrong to be righted, even in these times, is not enough to convict someone fairly. Either he is guilty or he is not. That's our system. Can our system be manipulated by high priced hired help? duh.... But sorry, it just doesn't happen that often at all.

I notice the article says he has a court appointed attorney.

[Lux]

Death penalty cases usually take circumstances into account. I presided over a jury once that did not go to death penalty because a man had killed his wife and it would have left the child without a living parent. Similiar cases have gone to death penalty in the absence of such circumstances.

[Lux]

Flight Instructor: Moussaoui Was 'Credible' Pilot

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Flight-school instructors recounted Zacarias Moussaoui (http://javascript%3Cb%3E%3C/b%3E:siteSearch%28%27%20Zacarias%20Moussaoui%27%29 ;)'s training for a pilot's license Thursday as the government sought to build its case that he was a credible terrorist threat, not the hopeless malcontent portrayed by his lawyers.

Oklahoma instructor Shohaib Kassam (http://javascript%3Cb%3E%3C/b%3E:siteSearch%28%27Shohaib%20Kassam%27%29;) said he flew more than 50 hours with Moussaoui and believed he could have obtained his private pilot's license with more practice, although he said he was a decidedly below-average student.

And Clarence Prevost, from a Minnesota flight school, said he provided simulator training to Moussaoui on a Boeing 747-400 (http://javascript%3Cb%3E%3C/b%3E:siteSearch%28%27Boeing%20747-400%27%29;). He said the 747 training is nearly identical to training on the Boeing 757 or 767, the airliners hijacked on Sept. 11, 2001.

Prevost said Moussaoui had far less training than any other student pilot he had taught, but he assumed Moussaoui was a rich man who was "just fulfilling a dream to play at it."....

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,187309,00.html

[Lux]

Moussaoui Says He Was Part of Plot to Attack White House

ALEXANDRIA, Va., March 27 — Zacarias Moussaoui testified in Federal District Court here today that he knew of Al Qaeda's plans to fly jetliners into the World Trade Center and that he was to have piloted an airliner into the White House on Sept. 11, 2001.

Taking the stand before the jury that will determine whether he is put to death or spends the rest of his life in prison, Mr. Moussaoui related in calm, measured language that he was to have been accompanied on his death-dive into the White House by Richard C. Reid, the so-called shoe bomber, among others.

But when asked by his lawyer, Gerald T. Zerkin, about what role he had in planning the attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people, Mr. Moussaoui said, "It's difficult to say for sure what exactly my input was."

And Mr. Moussaoui disputed the suggestion by the chief federal prosecutor, Robert G. Spencer, that he was "a big shot in Al Qaeda," as Mr. Spencer put it in his cross-examination.

"Intermediate," Mr. Moussaoui described himself.

Intelligence officials have long thought that Mr. Moussaoui was in some way going to be involved in an aerial attack, but have never had a clear sense of exactly what his role was to be.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/27/politics/27cnd-moussaoui.html?hp&ex=1143522000&en=6c897f62dc796988&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[MEALTICKET]

Good think sportslux. I wounder if we can milk him for more intel if we keep him alive though????

Lastly I think we should kill him if he is not offeing ay more info!!

[Jamel]

Kill him, all of them want to die anyway. Let him go get his 40 virgins.

[RET]

Kill him, all of them want to die anyway. Let him go get his 40 virgins.

Part of me says don't give him what he wants ... (read above quote).

[stayfrosty5]

I would love to see this guy dead as soon as possible... I'd pull the trigger if they let me.

But after what has happened in the last few days, I'd rather him rot in prison. This guy wants nothing more in the world than to be given the death sentence and die a martyr. I believe that he is exaggerating his role to get what he wants. I think he is PRAYING for the chair and martyrdom over life without parole.

frosty