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Tarek Mehanna: A Hero For Villains
16 Apr 2012 by Zach Novetsky in Campaign Finance and Politics, Fordham University School of Law, International Law, Law School Marketing, Law School to Law Firm, Top Legal Blogs, U.S. Regional News, Uncategorized, West US Legal News / 12 Comments
It is strange that Tarek Mehanna connected with Batman, the comic-book superhero, when the role of villain is more befitting. Mehanna, a Bostonian who traveled to Yemen in search of training with a terrorist group in 2004 and later used the Internet to spread al-Qaeda’s message, was sentenced to 17 ½ years in prison on Thursday. Not even J.W. Carney Jr., one of the best defense lawyers in the country (whose other clients include notorious gangster James “Whitey” Bulger), could convince the jury of Mehanna’s innocence. Yet this did not prevent an outpouring of support for Mehanna.
Glenn Greenwald, a blogger for Salon, referred to the case as “one of the most egregious violations of the First Amendment’s guarantee of free speech seen in quite some time.” Writing for the Guardian, Ross Caputi offers total support Mehannapo0, even going so far as to admit that he has ”done everything that Mehanna has done” and freely ”advocates” for Mehanna’s “ideas” (actions and ideas that I will describe below in all their repulsive detail).
Those lionizing Mehanna as an exemplar of the First Amendment – an Amendment which Mehanna did not hold dear, to say the least – must either be ignorant of the facts of his case or are motivated by something more sinister (as appears the case with Caputi).
To begin with, Mehanna’s case implicated more than just the First Amendment. He was convicted of conspiracy to provide material support or resources to a foreign terror organization, conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists, providing and attempting to provide material support to terrorists, conspiracy to kill in a foreign country, conspiracy to lie to federal investigators, and two counts of lying to federal investigators.
Next, Greenwald, and others, also highlighted and lauded Mehanna’s sentencing speech (where he proudly admits to supporting the mujahedeen, literally “people doing jihad”, which of course does not faze Mehanna stalwarts) – a speech which, tellingly, does not mention any of the implicating facts of his case.
From the court documents:
- In the second half of 2003, Mehanna and an accomplice discussed a plan to obtain automatic weapons, go to a shopping mall, and randomly shoot people, but abandoned the plans when learning that their weapon’s supplier could only provide handguns.
- Mehanna translated into English the publication “39 Ways to Serve and Participate in Jihad,” made efforts to have the translation published on the Internet, and requested publication occur without using his own name (all on behalf of al-Qaeda of Iraq).
- Mehanna expressed a hatred of living in the United States (“I really hate to live in the country longer … I wish to go back to arabia … or some other place where I don’t see these filthy kuffar [non-believer]”).
- Regarding moderate Muslims leaders, of one he said “[s]he needs to be raped” and of another he said “I wish I could meet [the person] … and cut off his testicles.”
- In a communication recorded on Mehanna’s computer, he suggested asking for “Allah’s [ ] mercy on just the buildings[,] [destroyed on 9/11] not the sinners that were in it[,] as at least the buildings weren’t sinners[.]”
- In May 2006, Mehanna and his accomplice planned a movie night to watch video of Zarqawi beheading the 26-year-old American businessman Nicholas Berg.
To anyone who remains skeptical about the Mehanna case, I suggest reading the court documents because the evidence is both damning and overwhelming (as it needed to be to gain the jury conviction that it did), too much to include in this short post. And to those supporting Mehanna, let it be said: If Mehanna is a hero (or, as his lawyer declared, a modern day Martin Luther King Jr.), so is al-Qaeda.
Post Tags: al-Qaeda, Batman, First Amendment, Glenn Greenwald, Greenwald, Iraq, J.W. Carney, J.W. Carney Jr., Jihad, Mehanna, Tarek, Tarek MehannaAbout the Author: Zach Novetsky
12 Comments
Zach Novetsky
I wrote an extended version of this post, with more details on the case, here: http://hurryupharry.org/2012/04/17/tarek-mehanna-a-hero-for-villains/
18 Apr 2012 07:04 pm (@Twitter)
stan wrazoziski
You are a small minded Idiot and please state your facts correctely because the majority of ur bs isnt fact but your own opinion. freetarek.com if you actually want to know the real story behind this man. Im not a moslim but when I read this mans closing statements to the judge and jury.. I felt his pain and I realized how messed up this world it.
18 Apr 2012 09:04 pm (@Twitter)
MZ
Good lord, I hope you aren’t planning on focusing on 1st Amendment law. Also I think you are slightly less informed about the details of the case than you think. Slow down and blog less.
18 Apr 2012 09:04 pm (@Twitter)
theo d
Agreed. Now write your scurrilous essay about the DC Elites/Lobbyists and Israelis doing paid work for the MEK. What book of jurisprudence should be thrown at them for conspiring with and for “provid(ing) material support or resources to a foreign terror organization.”
Sauce for the gander is sauce for the goose.
18 Apr 2012 10:04 pm (@Twitter)
theo d
Where is your same analysis for all of the supporters of the MEK? How many days does it take to show some moral consistency? Unless morality and consistency aren't informing your principled blog at all.
23 Apr 2012 09:04 pm (@Twitter)
Abu Nadeem
There are several problems with your analysis.
In the 2010 case Holder v. Humanitarian Law Project, which decided whether or not providing nonviolent aid (such as legal advice) to terrorist groups constitutes material support for terrorism, the Supreme Court ruled that even protected speech can be a criminal act if it occurs at the direction of a terrorist organization. Thus, the question is whether Mehanna’s actions were done at the direction of a terrorist group or whether his actions constituted “independent advocacy” (in which the latter is generally protected and doesn’t usually win convictions).
Mr. Mehanna’s lawyers argued that his views have been misrepresented and that he doesn’t share Al Qaeda’s extremist worldview. Holding radical or abhorrent beliefs, however, is still protected by the Constitution. The basic legal standard for when speech becomes criminal is referred to as the “Brandenburg test” (which as a law student you’re likely quite familiar with, but for everyone else’s benefit I’ll describe). The rule, from a 1969 Supreme Court case, essentially stipulates that speech can’t be criminalized unless it is deliberately meant to incite “imminent lawless action” and there’s a reasonable belief that action could take place. Just simply translating stuff from Arabic into English isn’t a criminal act; your college has an active Arabic program that even translates controversial political speeches and the MEMRI videos you’re so fond of aren’t “supporting terrorism.”
None of your bullet points cross the realm into criminality. Heck, a federal judge let go the Hutaree Christian militia for plotting far worse; murdering cops and trying to overthrow America. Apparently since no action took place, it was legal, just as Tarek.
Personally, I think there’s something more to this. In his speech, he claims the reason the government pressed such loose-fitting charges on him was because he refused to become an undercover informant (something the Muslim community has heard a great deal of in the last 2 years) and that they used this as an attempt at extortion. I believe that.
Even if I were to agree with you, 17 years is quite excessive. When a man in Staten Island rebroadcasted Hizbullah’s TV channel in the US, he got almost 6 years in prison. Mr. Mehanna’s sentence appears excessive.
19 Apr 2012 12:04 am (@Twitter)
MarcV
Zach- Thank you for this post. I was as shocked by Greenwald’s support as you were. This case is not simply about “free speech”. Mr. Mehanna was doing no less than the American terrorist we killed in Yemen.
The posters here don’t seem to recognize that you can’t materially support a foreign enemy of the U.S. during war and get away with it. The Afghanistan and Iraq wars were authorized by Congress. What Mr. Mehanna did was no different than Americans who supported Germany or Japan during WWII.
Even more troubling, in his statement Mr. Mehanna declares that standing with foreign Muslims militarily against the U.S. has priority for him over his American citizenship. If this is not a blanket indictment against our lenient immigration and naturalization laws then I don’t know what is. We are sowing the seeds of our own destruction.
19 Apr 2012 01:04 pm (@Twitter)
rglewis
If you can't support a foreign enemy during a war then why hasn't the US went after the Bankers who have financed both us and our enemies for the last 100+ years?
24 Apr 2012 04:04 pm (@Twitter)
Conor Nugent
I don’t think it should be assumed in any conversation, Marc, that we did the right thing in killing Al-Awlaki without trial, or, in fact, any kind of rule of law. Or that we are doing the right thing in Afghanistan, or that we did the right thing in WWII, when we rounded up the Japanese into internment camps allied, and with a man who killed more civilians than Hitler.
Every story needs to be understood from both sides. Rarely is either one entirely in the right. (Mehanna’s conviction was, from what I can tell, probably right, though his sentence is excessive.) But from the evidence I’ve seen, the last just war the US fought was 1812. No country is Always Right; though we’re special in many ways, we don’t get a free pass there.
And, by the way, Mehanna is a natural-born American citizen whose parents were moderates who have never been suggested to represent any kind of threat. What kind of immigration law structure (other, I suppose, than limiting immigration to Western and Northern Europe) could possibly have prevented him from living here?
20 Apr 2012 11:04 am (@@ThatOneNuge)
Jesse M.
The examples following the phrase “from the court documents” show he was a reprehensible, hateful person, but I don’t see anything there that we would normally put people in jail for. Discussing vague plans to commit violence but then abandoning them is not a prosecutable offense as far as I know, nor is expressing hateful views or support of violent actions by others (would you be in favor of jailing a neo-Nazi for saying he hated the Jews and supported Hitler’s actions, for example?) The only thing that might be criminal in your post is the part about “material support” for terrorists, but that’s a broad phrase that can include forms of support other than money or weapons as discussed at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/21/AR2010062101811.html — your post might be more convincing if you were more specific about what forms of “material support” he was convicted of offering to terrorist organizations.
22 Apr 2012 07:04 pm (@Twitter)
Jay
You spectacularly miss the point when you draw a distinction between “1st Amendment issues” and all the conspiracy charges. The conspiracy charges were 100% made using his speech.
And MarcV accidentally makes a good point by bringing up Al-Awlaki. If it’s fine to murder him without any charges, then Mehanna’s treatment has been downright generous.
22 Apr 2012 09:04 pm (@Twitter)
rglewis
Your bio made me laugh
“dislikes terrorists”
I suggest you do some more research on who the REAL terrorists are and the REAL reason why so many people across the world have had it with the US.
I’d be pissed too if another country was murdering and exploiting my society while stealing all of our natural resources.
Not to mention, one prosecutor in the case was quoted “it’s not illegal to watch something on the television. It is illegal, however, to watch something in order to cultivate your desire, your ideology.”
So basically its illegal for me to watch something legal if it changes my ideology?
If you do finish law school focusing on national security affairs I suggest you go to work for the security of the people who are citizens of this nation….because we’re being screwed.
24 Apr 2012 04:04 pm (@Twitter)
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