Feds seek tougher punishment in UH student’s ISIS case
Justice Department prosecutors have appealed what they consider a lenient sentence for a Houston college student who tried to travel overseas to support ISIS militants, in what experts say is an unprecedented move in the prosecution of homegrown ISIS recruits.
U.S. District Judge Lynn N. Hughes issued an 18-month sentence to Asher Abid Khan in June after the 23-year-old University of Houston engineering student from Spring pleaded guilty to trying to join jihadist fighters in Syria.
“We feel the court did not apply the sentencing guidelines properly and gave the defendant an unreasonably low sentence for such a crime,” said Ted Imperato, deputy chief of the national security division for the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
The Justice Department’s appeal to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals signals a new line in the sand, said Seamus Hughes, who tracks extremist plotters on U.S. soil at the Program on Extremism at George Washington University.
“It’s a first for ISIS criminal cases in America,” said Hughes, who is deputy director of the project in Washington. “I think it’s very clear the Department of Justice was not happy with Judge Hughes’ decision.”
He said most prosecutors have asked for 20-year terms in these cases but judges have generally issued sentences in the eight- to 15-year range.
The sentence surprised federal authorities, who had recommended more than 20 years in prison and a lifetime of supervision for Khan.
At sentencing, Imperato noted
that Khan’s sentence was “a significant departure” from what federal probation officials originally determined his sentence should be, which was over 20 years.
Khan’s defense attorney, David Adler, asked for a departure from the guidelines, explaining that Khan, an engineering student at the University of Houston, had dedicated himself in recent years to work, school and family and had been speaking openly about his experience with young people who might consider joining terrorist groups.
“The man that stands here is a very, very, very different man than the stupid, naive man who believed this was a good thing to do,” Adler said during the sentencing.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Alamdar Shabbir Hamdani, countered this argument, saying Khan had not changed his ways. After his return to the U.S. he had helped connect a former Klein Oak High School classmate with a recruiter in Syria and he continued to share ideas about ISIS online.
Khan, a U.S. citizen, was the sixth person in Texas to plead guilty to attempting to provide support for ISIS. Three others are awaiting trial: Kaan Sercan Damlarkaya in Houston, Said Azzam Mohammad Rahim in Dallas and Matin Azizi-Yarand in Plano, according to Seamus Hughes.
Khan caught the attention of federal officials at the McAllen division while he was living in Australia in 2014. An agent testified that Khan sent a Facebook friend request to Sixto Ramiro Garcia, whom he knew from high school and their local Houston-area mosque. Garcia had relocated to South Texas.
He told Garcia, known as SRG, via Facebook that he wanted to join ISIS. A few weeks later, he told an alleged ISIS recruiter that he wanted to “die as a shahid,” or martyr.
Federal officials said Khan and Garcia made plans to meet in Turkey near the Syrian border. Garcia departed on Feb. 24, 2014, and Khan left for Istanbul the next day with plans to continue on to Syria, but he cut short the trip and returned to Houston after family members falsely told him his mother was in intensive care. Garcia made it through to Syria, where he sent panicked messages to his friend after he failed to show up.
Once he was back in Houston, Khan helped Garcia connect with an ISIS recruiter and gave him $200 or $300 to cover costs. By August 2014, Garcia made it to ISIS boot camp. On Dec. 25, 2014, Garcia's mother saw a notice on Facebook that her son had died fighting for the terrorist cause.
After Seamus Hughes tweeted about the Justice Department’s unique appeal, Stephen Vladeck, an expert in federal procedure at the University of Texas Law School provided further context.
Vladeck said it was a first for ISIS cases, but not for postSept. 11 terrorism prosecutions.
He wrote there were several examples of high-profile cases where sentences were increased on appeal, including Jose Padilla in the 11th Circuit and Ahmed Omar Abu Ali in the 4th Circuit.