Court nixes sentence of man in bomb plot (Ahmed Ressam)

[TechBear_Seattle]

Reprinted in full from http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070116/ap_on_re_us/millennium_terror

Court nixes sentence of man in bomb plot

SAN FRANCISCO - A federal appeals court on Tuesday threw out the sentence of a man who was convicted of plotting to bomb Los Angeles International Airport at the turn of the millennium.

Ahmed Ressam was arrested near the U.S.-Canadian border in December 1999 as he drove off a ferry with a trunk of explosives. Prosecutors said he was intent on bombing the airport on the eve of the millennium.

Ressam was sentenced to 22 years in prison after being convicted off all nine charges. On Tuesday, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco reversed his conviction on one of the charges and sent the case back to a lower court to issue a new sentence and explain the rationale behind the original 22-year term.

[pennylane100]

1. I don't think the sentence was too long

for someone carrying a truck full of explosives, unless he could prove he was carrying them legally. However, he gave a false name which probably meant that he was plotting to kill a lot of people. That shoud have sent him to jail for life.