The man who stabbed and partially blinded novelist Salman Rushdie on the stage of an arts institute in the western New York in 2022 was sentenced to 25 years in prison on Friday (16) for an attack that also injured a second man, the public prosecutor said.
Rushdie, 77, has faced death threats since the publication of his novel “The Satanic Verses” in 1988, that Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, then Supreme Iran leader, denounced as blasphemous, leading to an appeal for the death of Rushdie, a decree known as Fatwa.
Hadi to kill, 27 -year -old, American citizen of Fairview, New Jersey, was considered guilty of assaulting the author at Chautauqua County Court in Mayville, New York in February. He faces a maximum penalty of 25 years in prison for the accusation of attempted murder.
The video that recorded the attack shows to kill running to the Chautauqua institution as Salman Rushdie was presented to the public for a lecture on how to protect writers from dangers. Part of the video was shown to the jury during the seven days of testimonials.
“He is traumatized. He has nightmares about what has happened,” said Chautauqua County Prosecutor Jason Schmidt, after the sentence hearing, referring to Rushdie’s suffering.
“Obviously, this is a great setback for an individual who was beginning to emerge in society in his last years of life after hiding after Fatwa.”
Who was also injured in the attack was Henry Reese, co -founder of Pittsburgh’s City of Asylum, a non -profit organization that helps exiled writers. He was conducting the lecture with Rushdie that morning.
Schmidt said to kill was sentenced to 25 years in prison for prosecution of attempted second degree murder arising from the attack on Rushdie and seven years for second -degree aggression, accused by the stabbing of Reese. The sentences will be executed simultaneously.
Rushdie, an atheist born in a Muslim family of Caxemira, India, has been stabbed several times in the head, neck, trunk and left hand. The attack blinded your right eye and damaged his liver and intestines, requiring emergency surgery and months of recovery.
Killing did not witness in his trial. His defense lawyers told juries that prosecutors failed to prove, besides any reasonable doubt, the criminal intention to kill necessary for a conviction for attempted murder and argued that he should have been accused of assault.
The lawyer to kill, Nathaniel Barone, said his client will come with an appeal.
“I know that if he had the opportunity, he would not be sitting where he is today. And if he could change things, he would do it,” Barone said.
Matar also faces federal accusations presented by prosecutors at the US Attorney General’s office in New York, accusing him of trying to murder Rushdie as an act of terrorism. Prosecutors accuse him of providing material support to Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, which the US designated as a terrorist organization.
Killing should face these accusations in a separate trial in Buffalo.
This content was originally published in a man who stabbed writer Salman Rushdie is sentenced to 25 years in prison on CNN Brazil.
Source: CNN Brasil
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