Pulse Nightclub Shooter’s Wife Found Not Guilty for Aiding Her Husband
“I wish I had done the right thing, but my fear held me back. I wish I had been more truthful”
Friday, Noor Salman, widow of Omar Mateen, the Pulse nightclub shooter was acquitted of aiding her husband in his murderous rampage that left 49 people dead. Salmon was also acquitted of obstructing justice.
From CNN:
Noor Salman, the widow of the Pulse nightclub gunman, sobbed Friday as she was acquitted of providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization and of obstruction of justice in connection with her husband’s 2016 rampage.
A visibly anxious Salman, wearing a dark suit, stood in federal court as the verdict was read. She wept and heaved as her attorneys — one of them also crying — embraced her. She looked back at her relatives.
“Thank you,” she whispered to her lawyers.
One of her uncles, seated in court behind her, stifled a sob as relatives held one another.
As Salman left the courtroom, she looked back at her family again, her eyes red and teary.
“We are so grateful to them, so grateful for their verdict,” Susan Clary, the spokeswoman for Salman’s family, said outside court. “She can go home now and try to pick up the pieces.”
The trial took a bizarre turn when it was revealed that Mateen originally planned to shoot up Disney World. Mateen was spooked by armed security and at the last minute, decided to shoot up the nightclub (a gun free zone). Thursday I blogged:
Mateen pledged allegiance to ISIS and was killed by police after the attack. The incident was used by anti-gun activists to push for more gun control.
First, it was disclosed that Mateen’s father had worked as an FBI informant from 2005 to 2016. As a result, Salman’s attorneys requested a mistrial that was denied.
Wednesday, it was revealed that contrary to previous reporting, Mateen had not intentionally selected the gay nightclub as a theater for mass murder, but sought a Plan B after cops spooked him away from his original target — Disney World. Put in other terms, Mateen was deterred by armed guards and so headed for a gun-free zone.
According to NBC News, Mateen hid a gun in a stroller and planned to shoot up Disney World’s shopping and entertainment complex.
Salmon said she wished she had been more truthful. CNN again:
During 10 days of testimony, jurors watched surveillance video showing Mateen buying weapons prior to the shooting and also opening fire inside the nightclub.
Security cameras also recorded Mateen going with Salman on a shopping spree for clothing, toys and jewelry at several stores in central Florida at least a week before the shooting.
After Salman’s arrest, she said in a statement to the FBI that she knew in advance that her husband was going to do something violent.
“I wish I had done the right thing, but my fear held me back. I wish I had been more truthful,” she wrote in the statement, which was shown in court.
FBI special agent Ricardo Enriquez testified that Salman said in several statements to the FBI that Mateen watched jihadi beheading videos, purchased a rifle and ammunition and went to a gun range to practice.
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Comments
So both the FBI and the wife knew he was going to kill people, yet nobody did anything about it? I blame the FBI more than the wife.
If she had reported her husband to the FBI, he would have gotten the Nicholas Cruz treatment. They tried her because her husband was dead and they needed someone to blame.
I actually tried to reply to you with my three-paragraph comment but logging in made my reply go to the original post. Long story short: an agent felt he “got” her, and they felt compelled to pursue and get some kind of conviction.
Salmon was also acquitted of obstructing justice.
I wonder if this Kafkaesque charge is finally going out of fashion.
Sympathetic defendant and a weak case based solely upon a verbal statement. Not one that I would have brought to trial.
By the way, Noor was never charged with aiding her husband in any attack. And, apparently, there was no significant evidence that she aided him in providing material support to a terrorist organization.
The verdict does not really surprise me. The jury simply gave the defendant the benefit of the doubt in this case.
So both the FBI and the wife knew he was going to kill people, ( and aided them ) yet nobody did anything about it? I blame the FBI more than the wife.
I was never a conspiracy nut , but the events of the last couple years have been pushing me. Either there is unbelievable incompetence or the Alinskyites embedded in the deep state are playing games . It just seems the FBI is all around under and out on all of these mas shootings .
Case in point , the videos of students saying there were three shooters ( seen two ) have disappeared as has those videos (2) where students said they were told there would be a drill with police shooting blanks
The videos are now disabled
If she seriously aided him, they should have charged her with that and convicted her of it.
They tried her because an agent threatening to put her away so that she would never see her children again got her to make some very incriminatory things about herself to help him put her away for real. From what I heard of his testimony, he was, and still is, very proud of himself. Unfortunately, her statements against herself were no more credible than any of the other statements.
They charged her with obstruction of justice and aiding a terrorist organization. Omar Mateen was dead. Was she charged with 49 counts of murder as an accomplice? No. Was she charged with aiding him in any way? No. Was she charged with lying to the FBI? No. Was she charged with perjury? No. She was charged for obstructing justice, some way, some how, and the FBI/ DoJ judges this to have been with the intention of aiding a terrorist organization and for its benefit, so she was charged with that too.
What they had was a woman frightened out of her wits saying whatever she thought might make the FBI leave her alone, and when the FBI said incriminating herself would make them leave her alone, she tried that, too. Then, after a long gap, they prosecuted her. A jury acquitted her. Most people won’t be aware of these facts, but as I became aware of them… this verdict just is not a surprise to me.
The most troubling part of the government’s case was the 17 hour “interrogation” where she made incriminating statements about “scoping out the Pulse nightclub.” Cell phone triangulation showed that this was not possible. In addition, facts have come to light at trial where Pulse wasn’t Mateen’s first or second target. (Mateen mapquested “nightclubs” on his phone after he aborted the Disney location.)
So, FBI, tell me how she could have “scoped out” Pulse with her husband prior to the shooting, if her husband didn’t know about Pulse’s location prior to the shooting?
Funny how armed security deterred this madman from attacking a high value terror target. Imagine that!
Consider this from the point of the jury members.
They find out that her father in law was a long term FBI informant. Which means that it is highly likely that the FBI knew about the attack and/or was involved in it in one way or another. If she is convicted, that means that in the current lack of legal restrictions on any actions by the FBI and the intel agencies, that the jurors and their families will start having “tragic accidents”. Arkansas is now nationwide.
It is akin to a resident in a totally gangbanger controlled neighborhood being called to sit on a jury in a trial of a gangbanger who has the protection of the police. No way in hell is it safe to vote to convict. The only hope of safety for yourself and your family is to acquit and hope that they forget you.
And yes, that is what this country has become.
IN a verdict that surprised NOBODY.
Come on. The Prosecution lost this the moment that the “Father was an FBI informant” information came out.
Further, MAC45 above had it right. This was a weak case from the outset. The initial interrogation was HORRIBLY run. 16 hours? I’ve had confessions thrown out on FAR shorter interrogations than that, and destroyed officer testimony regarding admissions because I’ve forced them to talk about how they use Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) techniques to convince defendants to make admissions.
The jury foreman sums up the reason for the verdict:
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2018/03/30/noor-salman-jury-foreman-despite-not-guilty-verdict-we-were-convinced-she-did-know/
I was just reading that. If not reporting an attack was a felony, that would be one thing.. for that matter, I’m seeing news site after news site report that she was acquitted for “helping her husband plan the attack”. That’s only kind-of-sort-of true, isn’t it? And I understand the judge told them, “It’s up to you jurors to decide what aiding and abetting means and if this qualifies.”
I’m sure millions of people think she was just acquitted of murder or some charge related to murder.
She was never charged with aiding and abetting her husband in the actual planning or execution of any attack. She was only charged with aiding and abetting the materiel support of a terrorist organization with regard to Omar’s fundraising efforts and obstructing the investigation of the shooting attack by lying to the FBI. And, this is the point that the jury foreman attempted to make. The jury decided this on the narrowest of interpretations of the charges and on the strictest interpretation of reasonable doubt. Not exactly a bad thing. That is why the foreman stressed that, while the jurors firmly believed that Noor knew that Omar was planning some kind of violent attack, she did not know when, where or even if he would carry out such an act. And, even if she did have such knowledge, she was never charged with aiding and abetting that act. If the FBI ever gains sufficient evidence to charge Noor with aiding and abetting the actual attack, they can charge her and try her for that.
As I said before, given the charges and the evidence upon which they were based, an acquittal is not unexpected.
I’ve seen comments on other sites to the effect that the jury should have used jury nullification to vote her guilty regardless of the charges and the applicable law. Let’s just say I didn’t think much of the comments or those making them.
It’s amazing they brought these specific charges with this specific evidence.
Um, yeah. Talk about getting things exactly backwards.
Does this verdict make the DOJ/FBI look stupid and inept?
Gee, nothing to see here; move along.