WASHINGTON, 12 February 2005 — Lynn F. Stewart, a veteran civil rights lawyer, was convicted Thursday by a federal jury in Manhattan, New York, of aiding a terrorist by smuggling his messages out of jail.
Her verdict marks the first time that the federal government has prosecuted a defense attorney in a terrorism case. Defense and civil liberties lawyers said her conviction will serve as a chilling lesson, and said the government had criminalized behavior that would have drawn merely administrative punishment in the past.
The Bush administration hailed the verdict against Stewart as a victory in the fight against terrorism.
Stewart was the attorney for Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman, a blind Egyptian cleric sentenced to life in prison in 1996 for conspiring to assassinate Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and destroy several New York landmarks.
After 13 days of deliberation, the jury found Stewart guilty on all five counts of providing material aid to terrorism and of lying to the government when she pledged to obey federal rules that barred her client, Sheikh Abdel Rahman, from communicating with his followers.
Stuart often acknowledged that she violated government regulations, arguing that her obligation as an attorney was to keep her client’s name and his words in the public domain.
This strategy, and Stewart’s decision to smuggle out the sheikh’s message advocating the end of the cease-fire, troubled legal ethicists from both ends of the political spectrum.
Stewart comes from a long tradition of radical defense lawyers who stop at little in defense of their clients. “I see myself as a symbol of what people rail against when they say that civil liberties are eroded,” she told journalists following her verdict.
Two of her co-defendants were also found guilty. The jury convicted an Egyptian-born US postal worker, Ahmed Abdel Sattar, 45, who worked as a paralegal in the sheikh’s 1995 trial, of plotting to “kill and kidnap persons in a foreign country” by publishing a fatwah urging the killing of Jews and their supporters.
Stewart’s attorney pointed out that no one was killed or kidnapped as a result of Stewart’s actions in this case.
A third defendant, Arabic interpreter Mohamed Yousry, 48, was convicted of providing material support to terrorists, and helped Stewart and other lawyers speak with the sheikh. He was convicted on three counts of terrorism and conspiracy.
Stewart, 65, faces up to 30 years in jail. She remains free on bail, but cannot travel outside New York State.
The judge, John Koeltl, set Stuart’s sentencing for July 15. Because she was convicted of a felony, she will be immediately disbarred from further practicing law.
There were gasps and sounds of weeping from Stewart’s followers when the verdict was announced. Stewart turned pale, slumped back into her chair and began to cry.
“She thought she could blow off the rules that apply to everyone else because she’s a lawyer,” said Anthony Barkow, the assistant United States attorney who made the government’s final argument to the jury.
