HAMBURG, 10 August 2005 — Prosecutors demanded the maximum 15 years in prison for Moroccan national Mounir El-Motassadeq yesterday at his retrial over the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, amid German fears of a fresh acquittal of a terror suspect.
Federal prosecutor Matthias Krauss told the court in the northern port city of Hamburg that he had “no doubt” that Motassadeq’s claim that he had offered innocent help to the suicide hijackers was a lie.
“There was a group in Hamburg until September 2001 that helped prepare the attacks with the suicide hijackers in the United States,” he said.
Chief prosecutor Walter Hemberger began the closing arguments late Monday by saying that Motassadeq had provided “active support” to the three suicide pilots who were initially based in Hamburg with full knowledge of their plans to attack New York and Washington.
Motassadeq “in no way limited himself to just providing aid between (Muslim) brothers,” Hemberger said, adding that the defendant had contributed to the “concealment” of terrorist acts.
Motassadeq was sentenced in February 2003 to the maximum 15 years in prison on charges of membership in a terrorist organization and more than 3,000 counts of accessory to murder for his alleged involvement in the plot.
But a federal tribunal overturned the conviction last year and ordered a new trial on the grounds that the court had not been granted access to the testimony of top Al-Qaeda suspects in US custody.
The accused, who admitted at the start of his first trial to attending an Al-Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan, had power of attorney over the bank account of one of the suicide pilots, Marwan Al-Shehhi, which was used to finance flight training in the United States.
Hemberger said the prosecution had shattered the defendant’s claims to have offered only unwitting support to his friends, who were like him enrolled as university students in Germany.
A fellow Moroccan student, Abdelghani Mzoudi, was acquitted on the same charges Motassadeq is now facing in February 2004.
The case against Mzoudi also crumbled due to the lack of US evidence, leading German authorities to fear a new acquittal with Motassadeq.
The defense is to make its closing arguments Friday.
