Posted on May 15, 2006

Copyright © 2006 by Richard Warren Field

The decision caused quite an uproar, a gushing of debate and disappointment. A jury of Americans deliberated over the case of the only person to stand trial for the Nine-Eleven attacks, the only person to be found guilty in connection with the attacks, and recommended life in prison. Surely this meant our enemies would believe we are soft and lack resolve. Surely they would see our unwillingness to execute this confessed terrorist as a sign of weakness. Surely our error was obvious when Moussaoui himself said he “won” and “America lost.” But this verdict was a sign of our strength, and of our moral superiority in a world that seems eager to attack our perceived moral high ground. And subsequent developments, much less publicized than the verdict and the post-verdict outrage, have vindicated this result.

First, let’s get one issue out of the way. I am no “dove” about Nine-Eleven or the war against terrorists and the nations who sponsor them. My columns, last year about Nine-Eleven, and this year about Iraq, should clarify any doubts about that. If we are able to take into custody anyone directly responsible for Nine-Eleven, I would have no problem favoring the death penalty for such a person. But what seemed to materialize from the reports on the trial (actually a sentencing hearing) was the distinct possibility that Zacarias Moussaoui was little more than a pathetic loser, a terrorist wanna-be who in fact may have been too incompetent and unreliable for the ranks of his heroes at Al Qaeda, a pitiful man who may even have serious mental problems. To direct our collective desire for justice at this creature would have confirmed all the worst suspicions of those who believe Americans are too crude, too brutal, too simplistic and unsophisticated to address the threats against us without overreacting. If we had decided to execute Moussaoui, I think they would have had a point. But we didn’t. We proved that our system works, that we are just and fair, as a nation, and as a group of people. We can hold our heads up with pride. Our system works.

Those outraged with the verdict of life in prison raised a number of points to argue that death was the only appropriate sentence. There was the argument that he could have stopped the attacks. This may have been the strongest argument. But if Moussaoui wasn’t really an active participant, and there is certainly a reasonable doubt on that issue, then he couldn’t really be held accountable for not preventing the attack. Our system does not sentence people to death for failing to prevent a crime. It would be a moral mistake to make an exception in this case.

There is the argument that Moussaoui plead guilty, and the crime he plead guilty to, on its face, was a death penalty crime. This is a decent legal argument. But we’ve all heard about the weird creatures who come out of the woodwork to offer false confessions to high-profile crimes to satisfy some creepy need for attention. We don’t take their confessions and then execute them for the crimes. We ferret out the false confessions. At worst, we charge them with lying to the police, hardly a death penalty offense. The jury got the idea Mossaoui might be just such a person. They had the courage to address their doubts, to look at the guilty plea carefully, and then hesitate to sentence a man to death who may just be a deranged attention-seeker.

The outraged also pointed out that Moussaoui laughed during the Flight 93 tape as Americans progressed toward their deaths at the hands of fanatic Muslim terrorists, professed hatred for Americans and American society, and expressed his desire to kill as many of us as possible. This proves Moussaoui is a despicable creature. He is clearly our enemy. But laughing at the deaths of our countrymen and expressing a desire to kill more of us are not death penalty offenses.

For me, the bottom line is this—regardless of Moussaoui’s confession, which was potentially motivated by reasons other than true guilt—if we are not sure that Moussaoui’s actions (not his sympathies or his fantasies) led directly to the Nine-Eleven deaths, then justice demands that we not execute him. The jury appears to have at least partially embraced that same bottom line.

There are some reasons offered for sparing him that do not have any validity. First, he did not have to be on one of the planes to merit the death penalty. Active planners and participants are guilty of the crimes themselves. A death sentence for them would be entirely appropriate. Osama bin Laden wasn’t even on the continent at the time—he is clearly guilty of the crime of Nine-Eleven and will deserve the death penalty. Charles Manson didn’t wield a knife, but he ordered and orchestrated the murders he was convicted of. Hitler was culpable for the crimes his underlings committed in furtherance of his orders.

Also, the claims that a painful childhood as a victimized Muslim in Europe could excuse Moussaoui for any crime is ridiculous. Perhaps that childhood explains some of his mental dysfunctions. This adds to the pathetic-loser image of Moussaoui. But if he helped plan and execute Nine-Eleven, his childhood would not absolve him of responsibility. There are people who suffered through worse childhoods than he did and did not try to kill thousands of Americans. Adults have choices. No matter what their adversities, adults must accept responsibility for those choices. The “I’m-a-victim” gambit should not have been a factor in sparing Moussaoui from the death penalty.

We should look at our handling of the case of Zacarias Moussaoui with pride. The jury’s choice of life in prison instead of the death penalty was not a failure. This decision demonstrates how we are different from the savages who are attacking us. With all our pain and anger at their slaughter of so many of our innocent fellow citizens, we are still willing to weigh the issues and judge justly. We won’t execute a twisted, hateful person just because he says he wanted (and still wants) to kill us. We won’t use his questionable confession that he was part of Nine-Eleven as an excuse to kill someone, anyone, to quench our rage at the cowardly viciousness toward unprotected innocents demonstrated by our enemies. The world seems to view us incorrectly as vindictive, blinded by rage, lashing out at any available target. The Moussaoui verdict refutes this idea. We have shown the international community, including moderate Muslims who may be conflicted, that we are a just people, willing to be fair, in the face of egregious provocation.

Moussaoui upset those outraged by the verdict when he claimed he “won” and “America lost.” This was supposed to be evidence of how wrong this verdict was. First, why do we accept the pronouncements of our enemies without some scrutiny? We have done this on other issues, which will have to await future columns for elaboration. In this case, we certainly should have challenged this silly assertion. In fact, in a little-publicized recent development, Moussaoui has as much as admitted he did not win. He realizes now he is about to waste away in an American prison for the next three or four decades, isolated from most human contact. Now, he wants to withdraw his guilty plea. Now, he says he wasn’t part of the Nine-Eleven attack after all. In his affidavit, he praised his trial, “extremely surprised” that it was fair. Now, he denies he knew the hijackers. Who knows? His statements alone certainly don’t prove anything. But there is a chance he may now be telling the truth. If he was waiting for execution under these circumstances, we would yet again be the target of scorn from around the world for our “barbaric approach” to this foolish wanna-be. We might have even turned him into a martyr for Al Qaeda, Moussaoui’s life ambition. Instead, a jury of fellow Americans, operating within the greatest political and judicial system in history, had the courage to act justly, and not in accordance with the current public rage. So Zacarias Moussaoui wastes away with his hate, of no harm to anyone except himself.

Richard Warren Field is the author of the upcoming novel, The Swords of Faith. For more information, go to RichardWarrenField.com.