NEW YORK: A Brooklyn man was sentenced on Friday to 15 years in prison after pleading guilty to conspiring to provide material support to Daesh.
Abdurasul Hasanovich Juraboev, 27, was sentenced by US District Judge William Kuntz in the federal court in Brooklyn.
The defendant, an Uzbekistan citizen who once chopped salad at a Brooklyn gyro shop, was one of six people charged in the same case with plotting to aid Daesh, a US-designated foreign terrorist organization.
Prosecutors sought a 15-year prison term, the maximum possible. Lawyers for Juraboev sought no more than five years, calling him an “unsophisticated, gullible, and lonely young man” who reached “wrong conclusions” about Islam and Daesh.
Michael Weil, a federal public defender representing Juraboev, declined to comment after the sentencing.
Authorities said Juraboev had in August 2014 posted an online threat to kill then-US President Barack Obama on behalf of Daesh, and spoke of planting a bomb on Coney Island if the group ordered it.
Juraboev was arrested in February 2015, after buying a plane ticket to fly the next month to Istanbul, Turkey, intending to then travel to Syria to join Daesh, authorities said.
Two co-defendants, Akhror Saidakhmetov and Abror Habibov, pleaded guilty this year, and charges are still pending against co-defendants Dilkhayot Kasimov, Azizjon Rakhmatov and Akmal Zakirov, court records show. Saidakhmetov faces a Dec. 13 sentencing.
Saidakhmetov was also arrested in February 2015, as he was boarding a plane to Istanbul, authorities said.
The arrests of Juraboev and Saidakhmetov followed roughly five months of interactions between the men and a paid informant posing as being ideologically sympathetic.
Other defendants were charged with conspiring to pay Juraboev’s and Saidakhmetov’s travel expenses.
Another Uzbekistan citizen, Dilshod Khusanov, was in August charged in a separate case with having discussed with Zakirov providing funds for Saidakhmetov’s trip, and helping others join Daesh or Al-Nusrah Front, another militant group.
More than 100 people have faced US charges in connection with Daesh since 2014.
Brooklyn man sentenced to 15 years prison over Daesh support
Brooklyn man sentenced to 15 years prison over Daesh support
France’s Le Pen insists party acted in ‘good faith’ at EU fraud appeal
- Le Pen said on her second day of questioning that even if her party broke the law, it was unintentional
- She also argued that the passage of time made it “extremely difficult” for her to prove her innocence
PARIS: French far-right leader Marine Le Pen told an appeals trial on Wednesday that her party acted in “good faith,” denying an effort to embezzle European Parliament funds as she fights to keep her 2027 presidential bid alive.
A French court last year barred Le Pen, a three-time presidential candidate from the far-right National Rally (RN), from running for office for five years over a fake jobs scam at the European institution.
It found her, along with 24 former European Parliament lawmakers, assistants and accountants as well as the party itself, guilty of operating a “system” from 2004 to 2016 using European Parliament funds to employ party staff in France.
Le Pen — who on Tuesday rejected the idea of an organized scheme — said on her second day of questioning that even if her party broke the law, it was unintentional.
“We were acting in complete good faith,” she said in the dock on Wednesday.
“We can undoubtedly be criticized,” the 57-year-old said, shifting instead the blame to the legislature’s alleged lack of information and oversight.
“The European Parliament’s administration was much more lenient than it is today,” she said.
Le Pen also argued that the passage of time made it “extremely difficult” for her to prove her innocence.
“I don’t know how to prove to you what I can’t prove to you, what I have to prove to you,” she told the court.
Eleven others and the party are also appealing in a trial to last until mid-February, with a decision expected this summer.
- Rules were ‘clear’ -
Le Pen was also handed a four-year prison sentence, with two years suspended, and fined 100,000 euros ($116,000) in the initial trial.
She now again risks the maximum sentence of 10 years in prison and a one-million-euro ($1.16 million) fine if the appeal fails.
Le Pen is hoping to be acquitted — or at least for a shorter election ban and no time under house arrest.
On Tuesday, Le Pen pushed back against the argument that there was an organized operation to funnel EU funds to the far-right party.
“The term ‘system’ bothers me because it gives the impression of manipulation,” she said.
EU Parliament official Didier Klethi last week said the legislature’s rules were “clear.”
EU lawmakers could employ assistants, who were allowed to engage in political activism, but this was forbidden “during working hours,” he said.
If the court upholds the first ruling, Le Pen will be prevented from running in the 2027 election, widely seen as her best chance to win the country’s top job.
She made it to the second round in the 2017 and 2022 presidential polls, before losing to Emmanuel Macron. But he cannot run this time after two consecutive terms in office.
