Defense Rests In Padilla Terrorism Support Trial; Closing Arguments To Begin Next Week

MIAMI (AP) _ Throughout 53 days of trial, Jose Padilla's defense lawyers contended that prosecutors had not proven that their client was part of a conspiracy to support terrorist groups. <br/><br/>On

Tuesday, August 7th 2007, 4:59 pm

By: News On 6

MIAMI (AP) _ Throughout 53 days of trial, Jose Padilla's defense lawyers contended that prosecutors had not proven that their client was part of a conspiracy to support terrorist groups.

On Tuesday, they rested their case, without calling a witness or putting on evidence for Padilla. They cleared the way for closing arguments to begin Monday and then jury deliberations.

``Your honor, on behalf of Mr. Padilla, we rest,'' Padilla attorney Michael Caruso told U.S. District Judge Marcia Cooke.

Most of the testimony that began May 14 focused on co-defendants Adham Amin Hassoun and Kifah Wael Jayyousi, accused of being part of a network providing recruits, supplies and financing for terror groups.

The main piece of evidence against Padilla is a ``mujahedeen data form'' prosecutors say he filled out in 2000 to attend an al-Qaida training camp in Afghanistan. The form, recovered in late 2001 by the CIA along with dozens of others, bears Padilla's fingerprints.

Padilla's voice, however, is heard on only seven of the thousands of FBI wiretap intercepts collected during an investigation of Hassoun and Jayyousi, both 45, and others from 1993 to 2001.

Prosecutors say those intercepts show a conspiracy among the men to assist al-Qaida and other Islamic extremist groups in places including Chechnya, Bosnia, Afghanistan, Somalia and Lebanon. The ultimate goal, prosecutors say, was to use violence to establish governments under a strict interpretation of Islamic law.

The defense said the aim was to provide humanitarian assistance to oppressed and persecuted Muslims in these conflict zones, or at most to help legitimate fighters defend against invading military forces. They also said prosecutors failed to link the accused directly to any specific acts of violence.

Although Padilla is the star defendant, the level of his involvement in the suspected conspiracy is not completely clear.

His lawyers say he decided to move to Egypt and travel to Pakistan in the late 1990s to further his studies of Arabic and Islam with the intent of becoming an imam, or mosque leader. Prosecutors say Padilla was one of Hassoun's recruits for violent jihad, or Islamic holy war.

The FBI intercepts do not reveal any discussions about violence between the two of them, and Padilla is never heard speaking in the code supposedly used by the conspirators in telephone conversations.

All three face life in prison if convicted on all counts.

Padilla, a 36-year-old U.S. citizen, was held for 3 1/2 years as an enemy combatant after his 2002 arrest on suspicion of plotting with al-Qaida to blow up a radioactive ``dirty bomb'' in a major U.S. city.

Those allegations are not part of the Miami case, to which Padilla was added in late 2005 amid a legal clash over President Bush's authority to continue holding him without charge.

U.S. officials say Padilla admitted to a much deeper involvement with al-Qaida _ including exploring the ``dirty bomb'' plot _ during his incarceration in a Navy brig in Charleston, S.C.

But none of that evidence could be used at trial because he was interrogated without being advised of his legal rights and because he had no access to a lawyer.