Letters tell an alternate story in Ft. Dix case

[unhappycamper]

Letters tell an alternate story in Ft. Dix case
By Geoff Mulvihill - The Associated Press
Posted : Wednesday Mar 4, 2009 13:41:58 EST

MOUNT LAUREL, N.J. — Relatives of five Muslim immigrants convicted of plotting to massacre U.S. soldiers last year are still professing the men’s innocence.

Since their conviction, more than a half-dozen family members have sent letters to U.S. District Judge Robert Kugler asking for the verdicts to be overturned. The letters are the latest in a case where participants have come to see the judge as a pen pal: all five of the convicts have written Kugler at least once since they were arrested nearly two years ago.

The five, who lived in and around Philadelphia for years, were found guilty by a federal jury in December of conspiring to kill U.S. military personnel. They were acquitted of attempted murder after prosecutors acknowledged the men were probably months away from an attack and did not have a specific plan.

Prosecutors said the men were considering an attack on Fort Dix, which the Army uses primarily to train reservists for deployments in Iraq.

But defense lawyers had argued that the alleged plot was all talk — that the men weren’t seriously planning anything and that they were manipulated and goaded by two paid FBI informants.


Rest of article at: http://armytimes.com/news/2009/03/ap_dix_case_letters_030409/%2e