TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Defense To Seek Leniency

Sketch by DOUGLAS LAND

Ahmed Mohamed was charged with posting a video online showing how to trigger a bomb with a remote control.

ADVERTISEMENT

By ELAINE SILVESTRINI

esilvestrini@tampatrib.com

Published: December 18, 2008

Related Links

• Special Report
• Hearing Today

  Ahmed Mohamed

TAMPA - Defense attorneys for a 27-year-old Egyptian man who pleaded guilty to trying to help terrorists are asking a judge to sentence him to eight years in prison, not the 15-year-term being requested by prosecutors.

Ahmed Mohamed, a former student at the University of South Florida, is scheduled to be sentenced today by U.S. District Judge Steven D. Merryday for posting a video on YouTube in which he demonstrates how to use a remote-control toy to detonate a bomb. The purpose of the video, Mohamed has said, was to help "martyrs" who target U.S. forces overseas.

In a sentencing memorandum, defense attorneys Linda Moreno and Lyann Goudie maintain Mohamed should be spared an excessively long prison sentence, partly because there is "no evidence that anyone actually used the information that he produced to harm any American or any other person."

Prosecutors, in a memo submitted to the court last month, maintained that Mohamed came to this country to gather information about explosives "to cause harm within this country."

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT