Daily Standard: The Problem of the Lone-Wolf Terrorist
By Daveed Gartenstein-Ross
Last week, I blogged about why, even if Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar's explanation that he ran down nine people at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in retaliation for U.S. foreign policy is an accurate description of his motives, he cannot be prosecuted for a terrorist offense or receive a sentencing enhancement due to his motivations. Today an expanded discussion of this issue appears in the Daily Standard. An excerpt:
REGARDLESS OF TAHERI-AZAR'S TRUE MOTIVE, this case points to a real legal problem: Even if his statements trumpeting jihadist motivations are true, authorities can neither charge him with a terrorist offense, nor seek a sentencing enhancement based on his terrorist motives. This points to a significant blind spot in dealing with terrorism in the United States.
Taheri-azar is being prosecuted in state court, and North Carolina doesn't have an applicable terrorism offense that can be brought to bear against him. The state only has two statutory provisions dealing with terrorist incidents. One bans weapons of mass destruction, while the other amends the murder offense. The amendment to the murder offense doesn't apply here--not only because Taheri-azar didn't murder anybody, but also because it only applies when the murder was performed with a nuclear, biological, or chemical weapon.
The federal sentencing guidelines do contain a sentencing enhancement in 3A1.4 for offenses intended to promote a federal crime of terrorism. In turn, 18 U.S.C. 2232b(g)(5) sensibly defines the predicate intention for a federal crime of terrorism as actions "calculated to influence or affect the conduct of government by intimidation or coercion, or to retaliate against government conduct." While this provision may seem at first glance to apply to Taheri-azar, it doesn't provide federal courts with independent jurisdiction. Rather, the terrorist intentions must be coupled with an independent federal crime.
Quite simply, prosecutors would have trouble getting Taheri-azar into federal court because it appears that he committed no federal crime. The prosecution could argue that there was a federal civil rights violation because this was carried out on the basis of religion. But Taheri-azar didn't target his victims on the basis of their religion. He may have been motivated by religion, but federal civil rights laws really only come into play when the victim is targeted because of his religion. And Taheri-azar's SUV didn't discriminate between Muslim, Jew, Christian and Hindu. Federal hate crime laws seem inapplicable for the same reason.
Read the whole article here.
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Courtesy of The Counterterrorism Blog:
Last week, I blogged about why, even if Mohammed Reza Taheri-azars explanation that he ran down nine people at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in retaliation for U.S. foreign policy is an ... [Read More]
» About Taheri Azar from The Anti-Jihad Pundit
You can read Daniel Pipes: [...] No one who knew him said a bad word about him, which is important, for it signals that he is not some low-life, not homicidal, not psychotic, but a conscientious student and amiable person. Which raises the obvious que... [Read More]