On Friday, a man from New Jersey was convicted of the attempted murder of Salman Rushdie’s stabbing author several times on a lecture stage in New York in 2022.
Hadi Mattar’s jury, 27 years old, also found guilty of attacking a man who was on stage with Rushdie at the time. The rulings were delivered less than two hours after a trial in the Chutawuko County Court.
Mattar ran on the stage at the Chautauqua Foundation, where Rushdie was about to speak on August 12, 2022, and stabbed him more than ten times before a direct audience. The 77 -year -old novelist, 77, left a blind eye in one eye.
Rushdie was the main witness during the seven days of the certificate, describing the graphic details of his life -threatening injuries and long and painful recovery.
The judge issued the ruling on April 23. Mattar may receive up to 25 years in prison.
Provincial lawyer, Jason Schmidt, played a slow video clip to attack the jury on Friday during his closing argument, pointing to the attacker as he was arising from the audience, walking on the stage and broke in the running towards Rushdie.
“I want you to look at the unjustified nature of this attack,” Schmidt said. “I want you to look at the target nature of the attack. There were many people on that day but only one person was targeted.”
The assistant defender Andrew Protijan told the jury that the prosecutors had not proven that Mattar intends to kill Rushdie. Discrimination is important to condemn the attempt.
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“You will agree to something bad that happened to Mr. Rushdie, but you do not know what was the goal of Mr. Mattar, the conscious goal.” “The testimony that I heard does not create anything more than just a loud, messy woman who has been wounded by Mr. Rushdie.”
Matar was with knives, not a rifle or bomb, as his lawyers previously said. In response to the testimony that the injuries were threatening life, they noticed that the heart of Rushdie and their lungs were not hurt.
“It is expected that if you are challenging a person 10 or 15 times from the face and neck, this will lead to death,” said Schmidt, although Mattar’s mind is not possible.
Rushdie, 77, was the main witness during the certificate that started last week. The Booker Prize -winning author told the jury that he believed that he was dying when a stable, persuasive person ran on the stage and stabbed him and cut him until he was dealt with by passers -by. Rushdie showed the jury now the right eye, and is usually hidden behind a dark glasses lens.
Schmidt mentioned the jurors of the trauma surgeon, who said that Rushdie’s injuries would be fatal without a speedy treatment.
A video clip showing a MATAR approaching Rushdie Sitting from behind and arriving around him to appeal in his stem with a knife. Rushdie raises his arms and rises from his seat, walks and stumbles for a few steps with a mortar hanging, swing and stabbed until they fall and surround the spectators who rush to separate them.
Rushdie was seen fluttering on the ground, waving a hand covered with bright red blood. Schmidt freezes on a frame that appears Rushdie, and he is also blood, because he is surrounded by people.
Schmidt said: “We have shown you intention,” Schmidt said.
Records also picked up gentle and screaming from the members of the audience who were sitting to hear Rushdie talking to the founder of the City of Asylum Pittsburgh Henry Rice about keeping the book safe. Reese suffered from his gun on his forehead, which resulted in the charge against Mattar.
From the platform of witnesses, the employees of the Foundation and others who were present on the day of the attack indicated Mattar as the attacker.
I was stabbed and lowering more than dozens of times in the head, throat, trunk, thigh and hand, Rushdie spent 17 days at Pennsylvania Hospital and more than three weeks at a rehabilitation center in New York City. He detailed his long and painful recovery in his memoirs 2024, “knife”.
Throughout the trial, Mattar often recorded notes with a pen and sometimes laughed or smiled with the defense team during the rest periods of the certificate. His lawyers refused to summon any witnesses of their own and Mattar did not witness his defense.
General defender Nathaniel Baron said Matpar is likely to face fees less than the attack had it not been for Rushdie’s celebrities.
“We believe that it has become an attempt to kill because of the alleged victim’s reputation in the case,” Baron told reporters after concluding on Thursday. “It was from the beginning. It was nothing more than anything, nothing less. It is for advertising purposes. It is for self -interest purposes.”
A separate federal indictment claims that Mattar, from Vervio, New Jersey, was driven to attack Rushdie with a 2006 letter in which the leader of the hard -line group, Hezbollah, approved decades -old, or calling for the death of Rushdie. The Iranian leader, Ayatollah Rohullah Khomeini, released the Fattawa in 1989 after the publication of the novel “The Displacement Verses”, which some Muslims consider blasphemy.
Rushdie spent years in hiding. But after Iran announced that it would not implement the decree, he traveled freely during the past quarter.
A trial on the federal terrorist charges of terrorism will be determined in the US District Court in Boufalo.
And copied 2025 Canadian press
