BUFFALO, N.Y., 6 December 2003 — A second member of the so-called Lackawanna Six terrorist cell was sentenced to prison Thursday, receiving eight years behind bars for supporting terrorism.
Yasein Taher, 25, admitted he trained with Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan in the months before the Sept. 11 attacks.
“I’d just like to apologize to the court, my family, the community, and most importantly my country,” Taher said. “I know I’ve let a lot of people down.”
He was the second member of the Lackawanna Six — all young Yemeni-American men recruited to Osama Bin Laden’s Al-Farooq camp in the spring of 2001 — to be sentenced. Mukhtar Al-Bakri received 10 years in prison Wednesday. Al-Bakri completed the training; Taher did not. The other defendants are due in court over the next two weeks.
Taher pleaded guilty in May to providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization. He admitted he was trained in the use of weapons at the camp and said he was approached by a fellow trainee looking for volunteers for suicide missions.
He and the others were arrested in September 2002 after authorities were tipped to their travels by an anonymous letter. Taher’s attorney, Rodney Personius, said Taher tried to leave the training camp within two weeks of arriving and described his attendance as “a tragic lapse in judgment.”
