Criminal cases

The Holy Land Foundation (HLF) and its leaders have both filed petitions for re-hearing of their appeals from criminal convictions for material support of terrorism and other charges. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed their appeals in December 2011. The petitions argue that the court should grant a re-hearing because the case involves legal questions of exceptional importance. The court generally rules on petitions for re-hearing within 30 days. 

On Jan. 11, 2012, U.S. District Judge Nanette Laughrey sentenced former officials of the Islamic American Relief Agency (IARA) for violating Iraq economic sanctions and illegally acting as an unregistered foreign agent. None of the men charged in the criminal case, first filed in 2007, were alleged to have provided support to terrorists. In addition, a former congressman and U.S. ambassador to the United Nations was sentenced to one year in prison for obstructing justice and acting as an unregistered foreign agent on behalf of IARA. IARA was shut down in October 2004 after being designated a terrorist entity by the Department of Treasury.

The 2008 convictions of the Holy Land Foundation (HLF) and five of its leaders were upheld by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals on Dec. 7, 2011. Because HLF was unrepresented the trial judge appointed an attorney to represent it on appeal. The appeals court dismissed HLF's appeal for lack of jurisdiction, saying it "was unauthorized and thus invalid, thereby depriving us of jurisdiction." The court ruled against the individual leaders on most issues, but also ruled that although in some cases the trail court erred on the law, the error was harmless because there was sufficient other evidence to sustain a conviction.

On Oct. 20, 2011, a jury found two Minnesota women guilty of raising funds for al Shabaab, Somali militants that are on the U.S. terrorist list. The women were convicted on charges including conspiracy to provide material support to a designated terrorist organization and lying to Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) agents. Each count of providing material support carries a 15-year sentence; lying to the FBI carries a maximum of eight years. The women insisted the money was not going to fund terrorism and were instead raising money to help the people affected by the famine and civil war in Somalia. They also said at the time they were unaware al Shabaab was on the U.S. list. No date has been set for their sentencing.

On Sept. 27, 2011 the former head of an Oregon-based charity was sentenced to nearly three years in prison for tax evasion and conspiracy to defraud the government.    The sentence comes more than a year after Pete Seda, the co-founder of the now-defunct Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation in Ashland, was convicted in September 2010. Federal Judge Michael Hogan said there was insufficient evidence to add an additional 8 years to the sentence for “terrorism enhacement” as prosecutors had requested. Attorneys for Seda said they will file an appeal.

The trial of two Minnesotans accused of funneling money to a designated terrorist group in Somalia held closing arguments on Oct. 17, 2011. The two women each face one charge of conspiracy to provide material support to al-Shabaab, a U.S. designated terrorist organization that operates in Somalia, and other charges. Attorneys for the defendants claim they were helping their fellow Somalis and unaware of the U.S. designation of al-Shabaab as a terrorist group. Al-Shabaab was designated as a foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. government in February 2008.