Jury Convicts 5 of 6 Defendants in Alleged Plot to Attack Sears Tower
The third time was the charm, from the government’s standpoint, in the trial of the so-called Liberty City Six.
Five of the six defendants were convicted today by a federal jury in Miami, reports the Associated Press. It was their third trial concerning their alleged Florida-based plot to join with al-Qaida in destroying the Sears Tower in Chicago and other structures; the earlier two ended in mistrials.
However, only one of the defendants, ringleader Narseal Batiste, 35, was convicted of all four terrorism-related conspiracy counts, the news agency writes. He could be sentenced to as much as 70 years in prison.
Patrick Abraham, 29, was convicted of three, and could get as much as 50 years. Burson Augustin, 24, Rotschild Augustine, 25, and Stanley Grant Phanor, 33, were convicted on two counts, and face maximum sentences of 30 years.
The one acquitted defendant, 25-year-old Naudimar Herrera, praised God, cried outside the courtroom and said his co-defendants had been wrongly convicted, reports the Miami Herald.
“It’s not right. They don’t deserve this. All of us were supposed to be innocent,” he tells the newspaper. “It’s all BS.”
Critics contend that a government agent lured the men into making statements they otherwise wouldn’t have made, in a claimed plot that they never had any intention of acting to implement.
Earlier coverage:
ABAJournal.com: “Mistrial in Sears Tower Terror Case”
ABAJournal.com: “Prosecutors Talk the Talk, Experts Say After 2nd Sears Tower Terror Mistrial”
Sun-Sentinel: “Liberty City Six: No verdict yet, and the government has spent millions”
New Times: “Liberty City Six Judge Refuses to Pay Private Investigator After He Speaks Out”
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