Prosecutors said Muse distributed $30,000 in cash taken from the Maersk to the other pirates on the lifeboat. The rest of the pirates took the ship's captain, Richard Phillips, hostage for four days, after offering to leave the Maersk in exchange for a lifeboat and Muse, who was briefly held in the ship's safe room with his hands bound by wire. Once Muse boarded the ship, a crew member lunged out of hiding to tackle and subdue him. Prosecutors said Muse was the leader of the pirates and among the first to storm the Maersk Alabama after shooting at the container ship from their boat. He pleaded guilty in May two counts each of hijacking, kidnapping and hostage taking. Remarkably youthful and underweight in appearance, Muse, who is thought to be in his late teens, appeared contrite during the sentencing hearing. Muse was the sole survivor of the four-member Somali pirate crew that attacked a U.S. Idd Mohamed, the Somali deputy permanent representative to the United Nations, told reporters he believed the US system was was fair and transparent.MANHATTAN (CN) - A federal judge tearfully read victims letters on Wednesday before sentencing Abduwali Abdukhadir Muse to 405 months in a federal prison, the maximum penalty the law allowed, for leading the April 8, 2009, hijackings of the Maersk Alabama container ship in the Indian Ocean. Somali advocates in the United States say Muse is unfairly being made an example of to pirates around the world. The next hearing was set for September 17. He faces a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted. Muse also is charged with seizing a ship by force, possession of a machine gun and hostage taking. He was rescued when US Navy snipers killed three pirates and captured Muse. Mr Phillips was held hostage on a lifeboat for several days after he volunteered to go with the pirates in exchange for the crew. She said Muse was just "a boy who fishes and now he has ended up in solitary confinement here so it is a truly terrifying situation."Īccording to the indictment, Muse threatened the captain of the ship, Richard Phillips, with a firearm and then, using a radio to communicate with US representatives, "threatened to kill the captain unless his demands were satisfied." He is confused," said one of his lawyers, Deirdre von Dornum. They said they could not reveal what the medication was for. The defence lawyers said they had difficulty communicating with Muse and he did not understand why he had been given medication. Outside the courthouse, lawyers said they were looking for witnesses in Somalia to prove Muse is a juvenile after a judge ruled in April he is aged 18 and would be tried as an adult. Prosecutors and representatives for Muse disagree about his age. His lawyers told the court that he needed an operation for his hand that was injured during the attack, and had been granted little contact with his mother and family in Somalia since being held in US custody. The slightly built Muse, who prosecutors said acted as the leader of the pirates, appeared in court in a prison uniform and entered his plea in a quiet voice through an interpreter. A Somali teenager accused of holding a US ship captain hostage in the Indian Ocean after an attempted hijacking has pleaded not guilty to 10 charges, including piracy and kidnapping.Ībduwali Abdukhadir Muse, the sole surviving accused pirate from the foiled bid to hijack the huge US container ship Maersk Alabama, entered his plea at the US District Court in Manhattan.
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