Sydney plane bomb plot accused Amer Khayat says Lebanese authorities bashed him, fabricated evidence

An Australian father of two facing a possible death penalty in Lebanon for an alleged Islamic State plot to blow up a flight from Sydney has accused Lebanese authorities of bashing him, fabricating evidence and forcing him to sign a false confession.

Amer Khayat, 39, gave an emotional and animated testimony for more than an hour overnight in Lebanon's military court in Beirut, where he stands accused of planning to blow up the Etihad flight to Abu Dhabi with 400 people on board in the sky above Australia on July 15 last year.

Australian Federal Police have said the Australian-Lebanese dual citizen had "no idea" he was carrying a bomb hidden in a meat grinder inside his hand luggage, but Lebanese authorities accuse him of being a willing suicide bomber.

Mr Khayat's brothers, Mahmoud and Khaled, are due to stand trial in the New South Wales Supreme Court next year accused of planting the bomb in his hand luggage as he set off from Sydney for Lebanon via Abu Dhabi.

The two brothers are accused of making the bomb using material that was posted to them, in a plot that was allegedly instigated by a third brother, Tarek Khayat, an Islamic State commander who was captured in Iraq earlier this year.

The plan was allegedly only aborted when an Etihad check-in officer at Sydney Airport ordered Amer Khayat to remove items from his hand luggage because it was overweight.

Australian authorities only became aware of the alleged plot when they received a tip-off from Israel's military intelligence 11 days later.

Following the arrest of Mahmoud and Khaled Khayat in Sydney, then Deputy AFP Commissioner Michael Phelan said their brother Amer was an unwitting participant in the alleged Islamic State plot.

"We will be alleging that the person who was to carry the IED [improvised explosive device] on the plane had no idea they were going to be carrying an IED," Mr Phelan said in August last year.

On Monday evening (local time) in Beirut, Amer Khayat told Lebanon's military court he had no idea about the plot until three weeks after he landed in Lebanon, when he read about the arrest of his brothers in the media.

Amer Khayat was arrested in Tripoli, in northern Lebanon last August, 10 days after the arrest of his brothers in Sydney.

'They made me sign a blank paper'

He cried as he told the military court overnight he had been interrogated by Lebanese authorities for 65 days straight.

He said he was slapped by interrogators and forced to sign a blank document, which was later filled in and turned into a false confession.

"They made me sign a blank paper," he said.

"After hours of interrogation, they took me upstairs and forced me to sign a paper."

Amer Khayat said he was in such shock when he read the alleged confession that he had to be hospitalised.

"Everything I read was false in the file."

Amer Khayat described himself as a former ice user with mental health issues who had been estranged from his brothers for long periods of time.

When asked by the military tribunal's chairman, General Houssein Abdallah, why he had "Islamic-related" photos on his phone, Amer Khayat said they were planted there by Lebanese authorities.

"They took away my phone, deleted girls' and boys' pictures and added these pictures that I have never had before," he said.

Amer Khayat was also asked about a handwritten letter to his daughter saying he wanted to commit suicide.

"It's not my handwriting," he said.

"You can verify that. The officer wrote a letter in English and forced me to sign it.

"They would do anything to lock me up because they are after Tarek Khayat."

The Barbie doll bomb

Amer Khayat's older brother Tarek was a senior Islamic State commander who was wanted by Lebanon for allegedly trying to set up an IS emirate in the country's north and for leading his followers in battles against the Lebanese army in Tripoli in 2014, shortly before he fled to Syria.

According to Lebanese authorities, Amer Khayat also confessed to trying to smuggle a bomb in a Barbie doll onto the plane.

Overnight he told the court he never brought the doll to the airport.

The ABC understands Mahmoud and Khaled Khayat will not face any allegations in Australia that they tried to plant a bomb in a Barbie doll.

Mahmoud and Khaled Khayat have pleaded not guilty to two charges each of planning or preparing to commit a terrorist act.

The case against Amer Khayat will return to Lebanon's military court in Beirut in September.

Human rights groups have previously accused Lebanese authorities of torturing suspects and forcing them to provide false evidence.

Source: abc.net.au, Sean Rubinsztein-Dunlop and Cherine Yazbeck, July 31, 2018

⚑ | Report an error, an omission, a typo; suggest a story or a new angle to an existing story; submit a piece, a comment; recommend a resource; contact the webmaster, contact us: deathpenaltynews@gmail.com.

Opposed to Capital Punishment? Help us keep this blog up and running! DONATE!

"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted." -- Oscar Wilde

South Carolina | Inmate who believes he’s died repeatedly can’t be executed, judge rules

SPARTANBURG — A 59-year-old man sentenced to death for killing a state trooper in Greenville County in 2000 can’t be executed because of a mental illness that’s left him incoherent and believing he’s immortal, a Circuit Court judge has ruled. John Richard Wood is the first condemned inmate in South Carolina found not competent to be executed since the state restarted capital punishment in September 2024. The seven executions since then include three men who chose to die by firing squad — the latest in November. Wood, convicted 24 years ago, was among death row inmates in line to receive a death warrant after exhausting their regular appeals.

Idaho eyes restart of death row executions as firing squad draws near

BOISE, Idaho — Idaho’s prison system has nearly completed execution chamber upgrades to carry out the death penalty by firing squad as the state’s lead method and will have a team of riflemen ready to go by the time a state law takes effect this summer. As part of the transition, the Idaho Department of Correction hopes to limit participation by its officers as the shooting of condemned people in prison to death is prioritized over lethal injection. Toward that effort, prisoner leadership sought to implement a push-button technology to avoid needing IDOC workers to pull the triggers.

Florida executes James Ernest Hitchcock

STARKE, Fla. (AP) — A Florida man convicted of beating and choking his brother’s 13-year-old stepdaughter to death nearly 50 years ago was executed Thursday evening. James Ernest Hitchcock, 70, was pronounced dead at 6:12 p.m. following a lethal injection at Florida State Prison near Starke. He was convicted of the July 1976 killing of Cynthia Driggers. The curtain to the death chamber opened promptly at the 6 p.m. execution time. Hitchcock’s entire body was covered in a sheet up to his head. He stared at the ceiling as the team warden made a call, then gave his final statement.

20 Minutes to Death: Witness to the Last Execution in France

The following document is a firsthand account of the final moments of Hamida Djandoubi, a convicted murderer executed by guillotine at Marseille’s Baumettes Prison on September 10, 1977. The record—dated September 9—was written by Monique Mabelly, a judge appointed by the state to witness the proceedings. Djandoubi’s execution would ultimately be the last carried out in France before capital punishment was abolished in 1981. At the time, President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing—who had publicly voiced his "deep aversion to the death penalty" prior to his election—rejected Djandoubi’s appeal for clemency. Choosing to let "justice take its course," the President allowed the execution to proceed, just as he had in two previous cases during his term: Christian Ranucci , executed on July 28, 1976 and Jérôme Carrein , executed on June 23, 1977. Hamida Djandoubi , a Tunisian national, was sentenced to death for killing his former lover, Elisabeth Bousquet. He was execu...

China | Man sentenced to death for murder executed in Yunnan

Tian Yongming, who was initially sentenced for a series of violent crimes and then had his sentence changed to death early this year, has been executed in Yunnan province following approval from China's top court. The execution was carried out by the Intermediate People's Court in Yuxi, Yunnan, on Tuesday, with local prosecutors supervising the process. Before the execution, Tian was allowed to meet with his family members. The case dates back to September 1996, when Tian was sentenced to nine years in prison for the rape and attempted murder of his sister-in-law. After his release on July 15, 2002, he plotted revenge against the woman. On the night of Nov 13, 2002, he broke into her home armed with a knife.

Texas | James Broadnax's appeals: US Supreme Court denies 2 claims, confession pending

Despite an 11th-hour confession from another man, James Broadnax is slated to be executed by the state of Texas later this week. Broadnax, 37, is scheduled to be put to death by lethal injection April 30 in Huntsville. He was condemned by a Dallas County jury in 2009 for the deaths of Stephen Swan, 26, and Matthew Butler, 28, outside their Garland music studio. Broadnax and his cousin, Demarius Cummings, had set out to rob the men, but left with only $2 and a 1995 Ford, according to previous reporting from The Dallas Morning News.

Arizona | Man who murdered pastor crucifixion style requests plea deal after parents killed in plane crash

Adam Sheafe, the California man who admitted to killing a New River, Arizona, pastor in a crucifixion-style attack, has asked prosecutors to offer him a plea deal that would result in a natural life sentence rather than the death penalty he had previously sought. Advisory council attorneys representing Sheafe sent a formal plea offer to prosecutors this week, about two weeks after his father and stepmother died in a plane crash at Marana Airport on April 8, according to 12 News. Sheafe, 51, is charged with first-degree murder in the death of William Schonemann, 76, pastor of New River Bible Church, who was found dead inside his home last April.

US Department of Justice announces decision to resume federal executions

The Department of Justice (DOJ) announced on Friday that it will resume the federal use of capital punishment and that it is seeking death sentences against 44 defendants. DOJ also said that it will use firing squads, electrocution, or nitrogen asphyxiation if the drug used in lethal injection is unavailable. The announcement follows the Restoring and Strengthening the Federal Death Penalty report, published on April 24. The report is especially critical of the moratorium on federal executions, ordered by Attorney General Merrick Garland in July 2021, to remain until the death penalty could be conducted “fairly and humanely.” Garland was concerned about the federal lethal injection protocol, which uses only one drug, pentobarbital, and the possibility that it causes “unnecessary pain and suffering.” In response to Garland’s moratorium and concerns, President Biden commuted the sentences of 37 prisoners on federal death row, leaving only three prisoners.

Florida executes Chadwick Scott Willacy

STARKE, Fla. -- A Florida man who set his neighbor on fire after she returned from work to find him burglarizing her home was executed Tuesday evening. Chadwick Scott Willacy, 58, received a three-drug injection and was pronounced dead at 6:15 p.m. at Florida State Prison near Starke for the 1990 killing of Marlys Sather. It was Florida's fifth execution this year. The curtain to the execution chamber went up promptly at the scheduled 6 p.m. time, and the lethal injection got underway two minutes later, after Willacy made a brief statement.

Iran to execute first woman linked to mass protests after ‘forced confessions’

Bita Hemmati and three others have been sentenced to death for 'collusion' and 'propaganda.' Advocates claim the charges are baseless, citing a secretive process and state-televised interrogations. Iranian authorities are preparing to execute Bita Hemmati, the first woman sentenced to death in connection with the mass protests in Tehran in late December and January, according to the US-based non-profit the Human Rights Activists News Agency. Judge Iman Afshari, of Branch 26 of the Tehran Revolutionary Court, sentenced Hemmati, her husband, Mohammadreza Majidi Asl, and Behrouz Zamaninezhad, and Kourosh Zamaninezhad to death on the charge of “operational action for the hostile government of the United States and hostile groups,” in addition to discretionary imprisonment period of five years on the charge of “assembly and collusion against national security.”

Death Penalty News

Search This Blog