TAMPA - The YouTube video was on the Internet only a few days but was viewed nearly 800 times before the Web site operators saw it and took it down, prosecutors said. "There's no way to know how far it went, to whom and what they did with it," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Jay Hoffer.
In the video, Ahmed Mohamed, then a student at the University of South Florida, showed how to modify a plastic toy car so it could be used to remotely set off a bomb. The idea, Mohamed has admitted, was to target "infidels," including American troops overseas, without "martyrs" having to sacrifice their lives.
For that, Mohamed was sentenced today to 15 years in federal prison, the maximum allowed under the law for the charge he pleaded guilty to, providing material support to terrorists.
The video was shown in court today, its first public display since Mohamed was arrested Aug. 4, 2007, in South Carolina, along with fellow student, Youssef Megahed, after deputies found what prosecutors say was explosive materials in the trunk of their car. Megahed, who has not been implicated in the Youtube video, is awaiting trial on charges of transporting explosives. Mohamed's attorneys argued there was no evidence that anyone ever viewed the video and took action as a result, that there were no identified victims of this crime.
"I admit that the video was something that was not a wise idea," Mohamed said in a statement read by his attorney, Lyann Goudie, before he was sentenced. "I do apologize because I never intended to harm anybody in particularÂ…I am convinced that I have learned a lesson Â…I am no more than a college guy."
Pssssst...Ahmed. Big smile for the judge.
Mohamed, 27, asked U.S. District Judge Steven D. Merryday to show leniency, to allow him to go on to lead a good life and one day have children.
Mohamed, who is from Egypt, hung his head low as Merryday sentenced him.
"I hear no contrition that I find convincing," the judge said. "His objective was to cause others to have the knowledge needed to do damage including death to persons in the service of the United States," the judge said.
Defense attorneys portrayed Mohamed as leading an otherwise exemplary life. His background was so clean, said lawyer Linda Moreno, that he worked for American companies in Cairo, including Haliburton.
Wouldn't that prove how...evil he is?
"While it's a terrible video, and it's a horrible video, in the context of what's happening in the world and in the context of what's happening in the Middle East, I can ask the court to consider it from that point of view," Moreno said.
We did. Fifteen years. Buh bye.
Mohamed used USF equipment at night, when no one else was around, to upload the video onto the Web site, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert Monk, who said Mohamed "embraces a violent and extreme ideology" and "has a particular dislike of Americans." Monk said Mohamed has said, "Americans are pigs. Americans are easy to deceive. Americans are scum."
Well... not that easy.
Mohamed told an FBI agent, "You don't understand, you have made me a hero." He also said, "Americans are more stupid than pigs, and you cannot deny this."
Might wanna learn to squeal like a pig, Ahmed. It'll make you popular with the stupid Americans who will be your new "friends".
According to Monk, Mohamed said, "It is the wish of every Muslim to die Â… at the hands of the invaders, and he will get credit for this when he dies."
Don't worry. There's still a pretty good chance that wish could come true.
Monk read from letters Mohamed wrote from jail to his parents and another person where he talked about the Muslim religion taking over the world.
The defense asked for an eight-year sentence, saying Mohamed has been mistreated while in the Falkenberg Road Jail awaiting disposition of his case. They said he was tortured in Egypt when he was imprisoned for four months without charges for donating money to the Red Crescent.
Geez, nobody likes this guy...
Goudie appealed to the judge's sense of fairness. The defense attorney said her son is in the military and served two tours of duty in Iraq, during the initial invasion in 2003 and then in 2005 until September 2006. She said she told her son before he went, "Remember when you're putting on that uniform that you're representing the United States of America." She said she urged him not to "ever think it's proper to stoop down to anybody else's level. Remember that you're an American and that you're fair and you're just."
I'll translate: I...got nuthin your honor.
The judge concluded Mohamed was a true adherent of his extreme religious beliefs. Such a view, he said, is not changeable through rehabilitation. Trying to persuade someone to change that viewpoint wouldn't be considered rehabilitative, the judge said. "It would be apostasy."
Heh heh heh. Looks like that one came back to bite you in the ass, Ahmed.