Excerpt:
A three-judge panel of the Ninth U.S Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld the 2006 conviction of Hamid Hayat on terrorism charges. The Ninth Circuit is the most liberal appeals court and the majority opinion came from liberal judges Mary M. Schroeder and Marsha S. Berzon. They ruled that U.S. District Judge Garland E. Burrell Jr. had handled the Hayat case properly.
McGregor Scott, the U.S. Attorney in Sacramento at the time of the prosecution, told reporters that "Hamid Hayat remains a terrorist convicted in the open courts of this country." He cited a guilty verdict, denial of a motion for a new trial, and now the appeal ruling as evidence that the prosecution was "righteous" and the result "just."
Hayat, now serving a 24-year sentence, was born in the United States but spent half his life in Pakistan where he attended terrorist training camps. The court found him guilty on four counts of providing material support to terrorists. His father, Umer Hayat, also of Lodi, California, pleaded guilty to a lesser charge not connected to his son's case and served 11 months.