A Virginia man imprisoned in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks for encouraging young Muslim men to travel to the Middle East and defend Afghanistan had his final convictions overturned by a federal appeals court, the latest development in a major 20-year legal battle over free speech.
"The First Amendment's protection does not depend on the popularity or palatability of the message conveyed," the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appealsruled on Jan. 9. "On the contrary, it is most vital when speech offends, disturbs or challenges prevailing sensibilities."
Geremy Kamens, a federal public defender who represents Ali Al-Timimi in the long-running legal fight, said his team was "incredibly relieved and gratified by this decision."
"When courts refuse to allow convictions based merely on the expression of ideas – no matter how alarming those ideas may be to some – they vindicate the First Amendment's core promise and demonstrate the strength of our system of government," he said.
Thomas Huff, who represented Al-Timimi for several years, echoed Kamens' comments, saying he was "thrilled" that the court "secured justice for our client in a remarkably high-profile case that implicated a number of sensitive and emotionally charged issues."
The ruling is an "important victory for free expression, and an overdue repudiation of the government overreach that marked the post-9/11 era,"Brian Hauss, deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Speech, Privacy and Technology Project, told USA TODAY.
"We're glad the court stood firmly behind the First Amendment," he said.
The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Virginia declined to comment on the matter.
U.S. marks 24th anniversary of 9/11 terror attacks. See the memorials.
How this case unfolded
Prior to the 2001 attacks, Al-Timimi was a lecturer at the Dar al-Arqam Islamic Center in Falls Church, Virginia, which he helped establish, the court's opinion said.
He was "viewed as a respected elder and a person knowledgeable about Islam," and the center fostered young Muslim men's connections with each other and Al-Timimi, the court said.
A group of them "began making preparations to engage in jihad in the form of combat," which included playing paintball for training purposes, at least as early as 2000, the court's opinion said.
At a gathering of one of their homes on Sept. 16, 2001, Al-Timimi told the group they needed to "repent," leave the country and "join the mujahideen," according to testimony one of the men gave during the trial and included in the appellate court's ruling.
The man reported that Al-Timimi said "it doesn't matter if we fight the Indians or the Russians or the Americans, that this is all legitimate jihad" and that it was "obligatory on all Muslims to go and defend Afghanistan."
He also encouraged them, according to the court, to go to Pakistan to "join the LET and get some training from the LET camps," a reference to Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, a Pakistan-based militant group that the United Statesdesignated as a foreign terrorist organizationin 2001.
Several men in the group ultimately went to Pakistan and trained at the camps, though they never "made it to Afghanistan – or anywhere else – to engage in combat," the court said.
A 20-year legal fight
Numerous people associated with Dar al-Arqam were investigated in the years following the 2001 terrorist attacks, and Al-Timimi was ultimately indicted by a grand jury on 10 counts in 2004.
The charges included soliciting others to levy war against the United States, attempting to contribute services to the Taliban and encouraging others to support the Taliban.
Al-Timimi was found guilty on all charges, and he wassentenced to life in prisonin July 2005. He appealed the convictions shortly after sentencing, the court said, though a "multitude of procedural detours" led to the 20-year span between his appeal and the decision to overturn the convictions.
Amid the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Al-Timimi wasreleased from prisonand put on house arrest.
A district judgeoverturned three of Al-Timimi's convictionsin 2024, but he remained on house arrest to complete other sentences.
Keeping convictions would 'undermine the rule of law,' court says
Judge James Wynn, who wrote the appellate court panel's opinion, noted that the government may only imprison someone for their speech if it is unprotected by the First Amendment, whichincludes speech that incites violenceor facilitates specific crimes.
The panel ruled that Al-Timimi's speech did not reach those standards because his comments were "vague and general" and he "did not help anyone to commit crimes," though he did "encourage them."
"But the most that he did to further the commission of these crimes was to advise individuals – in quite general terms – on how to react to the September 11 attacks: Leave the United States, '[j]oin the mujahideen,' and fight India or Russia or the United States," the court said.
It's not the first time the Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled on cases centered on inflammatory speech.
Hauss referred to the opinion in Al-Timimi's case as a "companion piece" to the court's1997 opinion in Rice v. Paladin Enterprises, Inc. In that ruling, the court said the First Amendment did not protect a publisher against liability in a murder case after publishing a book with instructions on carrying out a hit job.
Ultimately, the judges said in their ruling, allowing Al-Timimi's convictions to stand "would be to endorse a system in which speech may be punished simply because it alarms, offends or challenges prevailing norms."
"The result would undermine the rule of law by allowing constitutional protections to fluctuate with political and social pressures," he wrote. "Our Constitution does not tolerate such a result."
BrieAnna Frank is a First Amendment reporter at USA TODAY. Reach her atbjfrank@usatoday.com.
USA TODAY's coverage of First Amendment issues is funded through a collaboration between the Freedom Forum and Journalism Funding Partners.Funders do not provide editorial input.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY:Muslim man's convictions in 9/11 free speech case overturned
