Salman Rushdie attacker found guilty of attempted murder and assault

A New Jersey man who stabbed famend British-Indian creator Sir Salman Rushdie a number of instances on a New York lecture stage has been convicted of tried homicide and assault.

Hadi Matar, 27, now faces a sentence of greater than 30 years in jail.

The assault in August 2022 left Sir Salman with extreme accidents together with injury to his liver, imaginative and prescient loss in a single eye and a paralysed hand brought on by nerve injury to his arm.

The jury’s responsible verdict on Friday got here after a two-week trial in Chautauqua County Court docket in western New York state, close to the positioning of the assault.

The jury additionally discovered Matar responsible of assault for wounding the interviewer, Henry Reese, who was on stage with the creator. Mr Reese suffered a minor head harm in the course of the assault.

Matar’s sentencing date has been scheduled for 23 April.

Sir Salman, 77, testified that he was on stage on the historic Chautauqua Institute when he noticed a person dashing in the direction of him.

Recalling the incident, he stated he was struck by the assailant’s eyes, “which had been darkish and appeared very ferocious”.

He initially thought he had been punched, earlier than realising he had been stabbed – 15 instances in complete – with wounds to his eye, cheek, neck, chest, torso and thigh.

The assault befell greater than 35 years after Sir Salman’s novel, The Satanic Verses, was first printed.

The novel, impressed by the lifetime of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad, sparked outrage amongst some Muslims, who thought-about its content material to be blasphemous. The e-book was banned in some international locations after it was printed in 1988.

Sir Salman confronted numerous dying threats and was pressured into hiding for 9 years after Iran’s non secular chief issued a fatwa – or decree – calling for the creator’s dying as a result of e-book.

However in recent times, the creator stated he believed the threats in opposition to him had diminished.

Throughout the trial’s closing arguments on Friday, prosecuting lawyer Jason Schmidt performed a video in slow-motion of the assault, the Related Press reviews.

“I need you to take a look at the focused nature of the assault,” Mr Schmidt stated in court docket, in response to the information outlet. “There have been lots of people round that day however there was just one one who was focused,” he instructed the jury.

Throughout the two-week trial, defence lawyer Andrew Brautigan argued that prosecutors had didn’t show Matar meant to kill Sir Salman. Matar had pleaded not responsible.

His attorneys declined to name any witnesses of their very own and Matar didn’t testify in his defence.

In an interview with the New York Publish from jail in 2022, Matar praised Iran’s supreme chief, Ayatollah Khomeini, for calling for Sir Salman’s execution.

“I do not assume he is an excellent particular person,” Mr Matar stated concerning the creator. “He is somebody who attacked Islam.”

He added that he had solely learn a number of pages of the Satanic Verses.

Matar, born in Fairview in New Jersey to folks who emigrated from Lebanon, has additionally been charged in a separate federal case with offering materials help to the Lebanon-based militant group Hezbollah, in response to an indictment unsealed in July.

Hezbollah is designated a terrorist organisation by Western states, Israel, Gulf Arab international locations and the Arab League.