A Brooklyn-born man accused of helping Al Qaeda conduct surveillance of the New York Stock Exchange for a possible terrorist attack was sentenced to 15 years in prison on Tuesday, Jan. 20, in a New York federal court.
Wesam El-Hanafi, 39, was arrested in April 2010 along with dual US-Australian citizen Sabirhan Hasanoff, his associate. El-Hanafi pleaded guilty in June 2010 to providing material support to terrorists and conspiring to provide such support, Reuters reported.
Assistant US Attorney John Cronan said El-Hanafi’s efforts to fight for the group in Afghanistan and Somalia were turned down by Al Qaeda leadership in Yemen, sending him and Hasanoff back to New York, The Boston Globe reported.
El-Hanafi and Hasanoff were instructed to execute missions, including a possible attack on the stock exchange and on a “large American dam,” said Assistant US Attorney John Cronan.
El-Hanafi worked for Lehman Brothers in Dubai in information technology until he was arrested. Prosecutors said he advised Al Qaeda contacts on how to avoid detection during online communication and that he and Hasanoff sent $67,000 and equipment to Al Qaeda contacts.
Additionally, they said El-Hanafi admitted to equipping the group with radio-controlled cars that could be altered to facilitate remote-controlled bombings, encryption software to hide communications and camera equipment to document attacks.
“He was living the American dream,” Cronan told US District Judge Kimba Wood on Tuesday, according to Reuters. “And then he turned his back on America and aligned himself with our greatest enemy.”
El-Hanafi told Wood on Tuesday that he has changed during his four years in custody and now rejects Al Qaeda’s “terrible ideology.”
“I didn’t just make the wrong choices; I made the worst choices,” he said.
Wood said El-Hafani’s regret and the health issues he developed while in custody convinced her that the maximum 20-year sentence was not necessary, Reuters reported.
Still, El-Hanafi’s lawyers said his punishment was severe.
They said he developed a leg clot after his arrest during his flight to the United States from the United Arab Emirates. Because the condition was not diagnosed and untreated, they said he will endure limited mobility and pain for the remainder of his life.
“The executive branch of the United States government has given Mr. El-Hanafi a sentence far more harsh than any that could be imposed by this court,” his lawyers wrote in court filings prior to the sentencing.
Hasanoff also pleaded guilty in June 2012 and received an 18-year prison sentence.
(With reports from Reuters and The Boston Globe)
