Washington—Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, today released the following statement regarding the conviction of Sulaiman Abu Ghayth on terrorism charges:

“I congratulate the prosecution team for bringing another senior al-Qaeda figure to justice in federal criminal court for acts of terrorism. Sulaiman Abu Ghayth was convicted of all three counts against him—conspiring to kill Americans, conspiring to provide terrorists with material support and providing terrorists with material support— which will subject him to a maximum term of life in prison at sentencing.

“I expect that Abu Ghayth will spend the rest of his life in a heavily-fortified federal prison, joining other al-Qaeda terrorists including ‘Blind Sheik’ Omar Abdel Rahman, Zacarias Moussaoui and Richard Reid.

“The bottom line is that our criminal justice system has a strong, consistent record of gaining intelligence from terrorists, then convicting them.

“The conspiracy charges at issue in this case are commonly handled in the federal criminal court system, as are charges of material support to terrorists. Military commissions, however, are not currently using these charges against detainees at Guantanamo, pending results of appeals and further legal review. This successful prosecution again shows that the criminal justice system is not just a valid way to prosecute al-Qaeda terrorists, but a better and more reliable way.

“I look forward to seeing additional prosecutions of terrorists in federal criminal courts, including some of the terrorist detainees at Guantanamo. This is long overdue and possibly the only option for some detainees aside from indefinite detention or release.”

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