Gruesome testimony about a suicide bus bombing and a video of Osama bin Laden unfairly poisoned jurors against a Yemeni cleric and his aide convicted of conspiring to fund terrorism, a Manhattan federal appeals court ruled yesterday.
In issuing the ruling, the court overturned the 2005 verdicts against Sheik Mohammed Ali Hassan al-Moayad and Mohammed Mohsen Yahya Zayed and gave them a new trial before a different judge because of the “serious evidentiary errors” by Brooklyn federal Judge Sterling Johnson Jr.
The Second Circuit Court of Appeals also faulted Johnson for allowing prosecutors to present notes written by an informant who had “significant motive” to fake them.
Informant Mohamed Alanssi allegedly had sought $10 million for helping the feds fight terrorism. In the end, he only got $100,000, according to the 68-page ruling.
That prompted Alanssi to set himself on fire outside the White House to try to coerce the FBI to give him more money.
A source in the Brooklyn US Attorney’s Office said the case would be retried.
Al-Moayad’s and Zayed’s trial had taken place in Brooklyn because they were accused of raising money for al Qaeda and Hamas at a local mosque.
Both men were convicted of conspiring to provide “material support” to al Qaeda and Hamas. Al-Moayad was sentenced to 75 years behind bars, and Zayed got 45 years.
Both will continue to be held at a federal “Supermax” prison in Colorado, known as the “Alcatraz of the Rockies,” until their new trial.
Al-Moayad once called himself bin Laden’s spiritual adviser and allegedly boasted that he gave the terror lord $20 million.
But he told the feds his support was tied to bin Laden’s fight against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and that their relationship soured after that conflict ended.
Bin Laden reportedly issued a “fatwah” calling for al-Moayad’s death after the cleric publicly criticized him.
On Sunday, CBS’s “60 Minutes” plans to air an interview with a former Delta Force officer who says the US attempt to kill bin Laden at Tora Bora, Afghanistan, in November 2001 was undermined by Afghan allies who may have been in league with al Qaeda.
The retired Army major also claims that higher-ups in the military or White House quashed a plan to surprise bin Laden’s forces by sneaking up on them from the Pakistan side of the mountains.