Mistrial declared for alleged al-Qaeda plotters

US: A US judge declared a mistrial yesterday for six men accused of joining forces with al-Qaeda to blow up the Sears Tower in Chicago as part of an Islamic jihad against the United States.

It was the second mistrial declared by US District Court Judge Joan Lenard in the case involving the men from Miami's impoverished Liberty City neighbourhood.

US authorities had said the case was a breakthrough in their efforts to detect and smash home-grown terrorism plots in their earliest stages, and said the defendants conspired to bomb America's tallest skyscraper, the Sears Tower, and other federal buildings.

But after 13 days of deliberations, and three notes from the jury to the judge saying they were unable to reach a verdict, the judge declared a mistrial.

The defendants were filmed swearing an oath to al-Qaeda, but their lawyers argued they were playing along in the hope of getting money out of a man claiming to have links to al-Qaeda but who was actually an FBI informant.

Judge Lenard scheduled a conference for April 23rd to determine whether there will be another trial for the men, who faced charges that carried a combined maximum of 70 years.

The first trial in the so-called "Liberty City Seven" case ended in a mistrial in December when jurors said they were unable to reach a verdict for the same six defendants. A seventh man won acquittal at that trial.

At the time of their arrests in June 2006, federal agents said the men, who operated out of a ramshackle warehouse in Liberty City, had terrorist plans that were "aspirational rather than operational" because they had neither al-Qaeda contacts nor the means of carrying out attacks.

© 2008 Reuters

This article appears in the print edition of the Irish Times