Terrorist Supporter to Be Sentenced TodayLynne Stewart, an attorney who helped Sheikh Rahman by relaying messages to his supporters, is
scheduled to be sentenced today to as long as 30 years in prison (hope, hope!). Her defense essentially boils down to the Stockholm Syndrome:
The psychiatrist, Steven Teich, points to 11 emotional events that he claims prompted her to want to take action on Abdel Rahman's behalf, Stewart's attorneys say. Among the events that make Dr.Teich's list are her experiences seeing Abdel Rahman incarcerated and the 1995 suicide of a drug defendant named Dominick Maldonado, whom Stewart had once represented.
Stewart was convicted in 2005 of providing material support for terrorism for passing on the messages Abdel Rahman gave her and her translator during visits with him in federal prison in Minnesota. Abdel Rahman, the spiritual leader of a terrorist group in Egypt, is serving a life term following his 1995 conviction in a conspiracy to blow up landmarks around New York. Following a conversation with Abdel Rahman in 2000, Stewart called a Reuters reporter in Cairo to say that Abdel Rahman had withdrawn his support from a ceasefire that his terrorist organization, the Islamic Group, was observing in Egypt.
Since being indicted four years ago, Stewart had defended her actions.
"I would do it again— it's the way a lawyer is supposed to behave." Stewart told reporters the day of her conviction, the Washington Post reported.
Almost needless to say, she has become a cause celebre for the idiot brigade:
Stewart speaks regularly at political rallies across the city and beyond. Yesterday afternoon and well into the evening, dozens of speakers praised Stewart to a mostly graying audience of 500 at Riverside Church. Several members of the Granny Peace Brigade, a group of elderly women whose anti-war acts of civil disobedience have attracted international attention, sang a protest song in Stewart's honor.
Rahman is the
blind Muslim Cleric whose supporters were responsible for the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
Most of the bloggers posting about this are in support of a long sentence for Stewart.
Blue Crab Boulevard:
Regardless of what led to her decisions and actions, she needs to be held accountable for them.Blogmeister USA, talking about the American Al Qaeda spokesman, Adam Gadahn:
Watch for leftwing sympathizers and the ACLU to rise to Gadahn's defense. Too bad Lynne Stewart won't be available...she is the most logical choice. Perhaps Ramsey Clark will defend him!Sister Toldjah:
Judge Koeltl, show no mercy. I would love to see another Judge William Young-style ruling.Lawhawk:
She's been trying to play the leniency card, noting that she's being treated for breast cancer, as though that somehow mitigates the fact that she damaged US national security by violating agreements made with the federal government not to do what she did.Here's one of her
few supporters:
Rally to accompany Lynne Stewart to Court. Demonstrate your support. You cannot be too “busy” for this historic moment. One to tell your grandchildren about. Crucial to the atmosphere of outraged citizenry we need. Be there for the early rally. Go with Lynne to court. If there’s no room …rally outside the courthouse in the square. We are hoping that this will be Massive and demonstrate the strength of the People!!!
In a case that has echoes of Haymarket, Sacco/Vanzetti, and the Rosenbergs, attorney Lynne Stewart will be sentenced on Monday October 16. Of course, Sacco & Vanzetti were guilty as we learned this year when a letter was unearthed from lefty sob-sister Upton Sinclair acknowledging their guilt.
Howie Hawkins,
Green Party Candidate for Hillary Clinton's Senate seat:
“Lynne Stewart is just the latest in a long line of victims in the war by the Bush administration and a bipartisan Congress to repeal the Bill of Rights and erode civil liberties. Bush has callously used the 9/11 attacks as a pretext to curtail the right to a fair trial, to illegally spy on Americans, and to sanction torture. Here in New York, we have witnessed the recent convictions of Muslim leaders such as Imam Umar and Yassin Aref on trumped up grounds. Even the government has admitted that they want a long prison sentence for Ms. Stewart largely to have a chilling effect on other lawyers, discouraging them from representing controversial clients,” stated Hawkins.Hawkins is a moonbat 9-11 Denier who appears briefly in one of Dylan Avery's vanity videos of the Loose Change crew's trip to New York the weekend before 9-11-06.
Update: Stewart
gets 28 months, about one-twelfth the maximum sentence.
