WASHINGTON (AP) — Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, accused as the main plotter in al-Qaeda’s Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, has agreed to plead guilty, the Defense Department said Wednesday, pointing to a long-delayed resolution in an attack that altered the course of the United States and much of the Middle East.
Join our WhatsApp groupSubscribe to our Daily Roundup Email
He and two accomplices, Walid Bin Attash and Mustafa al-Hawsawi, are expected to enter the pleas at the military commission at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, as soon as next week.
Pentagon officials declined to immediately release the terms of the plea bargain. The New York Times, citing unidentified Pentagon officials, said the terms included the men’s longstanding condition that they be spared risk of the death penalty.
The U.S. agreement with the men to enter into a plea agreement comes more than 16 years after their prosecution began for al-Qaeda’s attack. It comes more than 20 years after militants flew commandeered commercial airliners into buildings. The attack killed nearly 3,000 people and triggered years of U.S. wars against militant extremist groups that reshaped Middle East countries and, in many ways, U.S. society.
Terry Strada, national chairperson of a group of families of victims called 9/11 Families United, had been at Manhattan federal court for a hearing on one of many civil lawsuits when she heard news of the plea agreement.
Strada said many families have just wanted to see the men admit guilt.
“For me personally, I wanted to see a trial,” she said. “And they just took away the justice I was expecting, a trial and the punishment.”
“They were cowards when they planned the attack. And they’re cowards today,” she said.
Dozens of relatives of those killed died while awaiting resolution of the case, Strada said.
Another injustice in the American “justice” system! Why was plea deal necessary altogether; they seriously couldn’t prove he did it?! And they had to wait over 2 decades for a court date and hanging the next morning?! Obviously, this plea deal was just an excuse serving the general Fascist-Democrat Party agenda of letting the islamonazis loose as a chaos agent unto the people of the United States.
is this Biden & Harris looking for votes? are they giving away America?
it took 20 years to get a plea bargain? and now they can serve 3,000 life sentences *concurrently*?! it’s almost enough to make a normal person nostalgic for the simplicity of sharia law…
“It comes more than 20 years after militants flew commandeered commercial airliners into buildings. The attack killed nearly 3,000 people and triggered years of U.S. wars against militant extremist groups that reshaped Middle East countries and, in many ways, U.S. society.”
“Militants”? Wow, I thought they were terrorists.
Their plea included a deal for no death sentence by the US Justice Dept. Little do they know that next week all their teeth will be extracted by pliers without anesthetic and will be dropped off in Gaza tattooed boldly on their backs and fronts that they are gay.