Pakistani-American David Coleman Headley was on January 24 sentenced to 35 years in prison by a U.S. court for masterminding the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks. The sentence will be followed by five years supervised release.
While the U.S. government admitted the “deplorable” nature of his role in the 26/11 attacks, the prosecution had pressed for a sentence of 30-35 years under a plea bargain with Headley in return for his cooperation. The death penalty and extradition options were dropped.
Pronouncing the sentence here, U.S. federal district court judge Harry Leinenweber said he had to consider that Headley had committed numerous crimes in the past, confessed to them and received lenient sentences.
Headley’s defence team argued for mitigation based on his past drug addiction and the need to set an appropriate sentence to encourage cooperation from future defendants in a similar position.
Under his deal with the U.S. government, Headley supplied information on other terror suspects, which, prosecutors said, helped them investigate and bring criminal charges against co-defendant Tahawwur Rana, Ilyas Kashmiri and several Pakistan-based operatives.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, there is no Federal parole and defendants must serve at least 85% of their sentence.
In pronouncing the sentence, Justice Leinenweber said: “Mr. Headley is a terrorist.”
“There is little question that life imprisonment would be an appropriate punishment for Mr. Headley’s incredibly serious crimes but for the significant value provided by his immediate and extensive cooperation.”
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