Terrorism

Despite Threats, Lawyer Agrees to Represent Mumbai Terrorism Suspect

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Earlier in the week, it was looking as if a yet another lawyer would bow out of a court appointment to represent the sole surviving gunman suspected of participating last year’s terrorist attack in Mumbai.

Anjali Waghmare wrote a note Monday to protesters who had been stoning her house. But after Waghmare was promised police protection, she agreed to continue her representation of Mohammad Ajmal Kasab, according to Voice of America and Bloomberg.

“Let me tell [say] I’m doing everything on my own risk for the interest of the country, which I reiterate and reiterate and reiterate the same sentence. I’m doing [this] for the interest of justice,” she is quoted as writing.

Waghmare, who is married to an assistant police commissioner, is to receive the highest tier of protection (“Z” level with 36 armed guards), a level normally reserved for members of the Indian cabinet, state leaders, members of the supreme court and certain politicians under threat.

Kasab is accused, along with nine other gunmen, of carrying out the November terrorist attacks on luxury hotels, a rail station and a Jewish community center, that killed 166 people and injured 304.

Several other lawyers have already taken a pass on representing Kasab.

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