November 8, 2007

Musician gets 15 years for backing al Qaeda

Losing his chops. From Reuters (thanks to Jeffrey Imm):

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A New York jazz musician and martial arts instructor was sentenced to 15 years in prison on Wednesday for agreeing to help train al Qaeda fighters in hand-to-hand combat.

Tarik Shah, 44, a Muslim born and raised in New York, received the maximum sentence in Manhattan federal court under a plea agreement with U.S. prosecutors in which they dropped one of the terrorism charges against him.

He pleaded guilty in April to one count of conspiring to support al Qaeda.