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American Shaboob gets prison for lying | |||||
2016-03-13 | |||||
A Somali man who admitted lying during immigration proceedings and a terrorism investigation was sentenced Thursday in San Antonio to eight years in prison, as he steadfastly denied any link to a suspect in bombings in Uganda six years ago that killed more than 70 people. Abdullah Omar Fidse has never been charged with terrorism but the FBI says it has tied him to al-Shabab, an Islamic militant group in East Africa aligned with Al Qaeda.
In December 2012, Fidse pleaded guilty to lying on an asylum application he submitted after he and a woman he traveled with were detained at the Hidalgo port of entry on the Texas-Mexico border in January 2008. He also pleaded guilty to lying to FBI agents who were investigating his alleged affiliation with terrorists.
At Thursday’s hearing, Roomberg told U.S. District Judge Fred Biery that when confronted by the FBI, Fidse lied about his past and his affiliations and by doing so, obstructed the FBI’s efforts to learn about potential terrorist plots. “I will admit we are speculating that maybe the (bombing) plan could have been disrupted, but at least we could have passed the information on,” Roomberg said. Fidse’s lawyer, assistant federal public defender Molly Roth, said her client disputes “many, many facts in this case.”
“This case is about words and words alone,” Roth argued. “Mr. Fidse … is not a terrorist. There is no evidence he intended to promote (terrorism) directly or by obstruction.” Roth asked Biery to sentence Fidse to the time he’s already spent behind bars, which includes time in jail awaiting immigration asylum proceedings. She argued that without a terrorism enhancement, a measure that increases a defendant’s sentence, Fidse only faced up to six months in jail. But Biery enhanced the sentence, giving Fidse four years on each count, stacked. It was the second time Biery had sentenced Fidse to eight years. After the first time in 2013, Fidse appealed and the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals vacated Fidse’s sentence because it said Biery didn’t clearly state his rationale for a terrorism enhancement to raise Fidse’s sentence. This time, Biery | |||||
Posted by:Steve White |
#2 American lesson for Shaboobs: first get elected to public office, then lie! |
Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2016-03-13 17:16 |
#1 That's a start, long overdue. |
Posted by: Voldemort Gletle4092 2016-03-13 14:36 |