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Third
New Indictment Against Moussaoui Carries Death Penalty
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| Moussaoui’s
mother, Aicha el-Wafi, appears outside the courthouse where her
son is currently being tried. |
ALEXANDRIA,
Virginia, July 17 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - A new indictment
against Zacarias Moussaoui, to date the only suspect charged in
connection with the September 11 attacks, was filed Tuesday, July 16,
by a grand jury to ensure that the Frenchman could face the death
penalty if convicted on terrorism charges, court sources said.
Prosecutors
decided to amend the indictment adding “aggravating factors” after
the Supreme Court on June 24 ruled that the death penalty issued by
judges instead of juries was unconstitutional.
The
federal public defender assigned to Moussaoui, Frank Dunham, but
currently acting in a “stand-by” capacity, brought the Supreme
Court case ruling to Moussaoui’s case, questioning the
constitutionality of the federal death penalty act.
Dunham
argued last week that the federal death penalty is unconstitutional
because it does not require a grand jury to include “aggravating
factors” in its indictment.
Saying
a grand jury must consider the death penalty issue in a case like
Moussaoui’s, Dunham said the ruling, in which the justices declared
unconstitutional capital sentencing schemes in five states, would also
apply to federal law.
The
court’s ruling means that the circumstances of the crime that
prosecutors claim make the defendant eligible for the death penalty
must be explained in the indictment and reviewed by a jury.
U.S.
prosecutors, following that ruling and Dunham’s argument,
subsequently altered the indictment against Moussaoui to include
“aggravating factors,” allowing prosecutors to seek the execution
of Moussaoui under the federal death penalty act if he is found
guilty.
Dunham
remains Moussaoui’s court-appointed attorney in the case despite
Moussaoui’s attempts to have him dismissed. Moussaoui is serving as
his own lawyer.
Dunham
contends that even a revised indictment dealing with the death penalty
should not allow the government to seek Moussaoui’s execution,
saying only Congress could fix flaws in the federal law as a result of
the Supreme Court ruling, reports news agencies.
“In
every death penalty case, every federal death penalty case around the
country, the government is having to do new indictments as a result of
the decision of the Supreme Court,” a source close to the Moussaoui
case told Agence France-Presse (AFP).
Prosecutors
“think they have to include some more information in the indictment
about the death penalty,” the source added.
Gerald
Zerkin, one of the attorneys dismissed by the Frenchman who is
handling his own defense, said, “we object to their doing that. They
cannot solve that constitutional problem by going back to the Grand
Jury."
Moussaoui
was arrested last August, and indicted in December on charges of
conspiracy to commit acts of international terrorism, conspiracy to
hijack an airliner, conspiracy to destroy an aircraft and conspiracy
to use arms of mass destruction. The charges carry the death penalty.
The
new indictment accuses Moussaoui of carrying out those four offenses
after “substantial planning and premeditation to cause the death of
a person and commit an act of terrorism,” saying he also
“knowingly created a grave risk of death” alleging Moussaoui
committed the offenses “in an especially heinous, cruel and depraved
manner in that they involved torture and serious physical abuse to the
victims”.
He
was initially referred to by Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
investigators and the U.S. media as a possible “20th hijacker” who
was meant to have been aboard one of the commandeered passenger planes
that slammed into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September
11, killing 3,100 people.
But
the Washington Post in November, and Time magazine in May, cast doubts
on that tag.
The
newspaper said the FBI thought another suspect, Ramzi Binalshibh, was
the 20th hijacker, while Time reported the FBI thought Moussaoui might
have been on a different mission.
Moussaoui’s
trial is scheduled to begin in mid-October.
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