Activist finally free of contempt counts

McLEAN, Va. — Federal prosecutors Friday dropped all charges against a Palestinian activist whose criminal contempt case had sat in limbo for five years in front of a skeptical judge.

Former University of South Florida professor Sami Al-Arian had been a target of the Justice Department for more than a decade. He initially was charged with playing a leadership role in the terrorist group Palestinian Islamic Jihad. He ended up taking a plea bargain on greatly reduced charges after a jury failed to convict him after a lengthy trial.

After accepting the plea deal in Tampa, Fla., in 2006, it had been expected that Al-Arian would be deported.

Instead, the legal saga continued when prosecutors in Alexandria sought his testimony in a separate investigation. Al-Arian refused, saying he had carefully negotiated the Florida plea deal to exclude the usual requirement to cooperate with government investigations.

But appellate courts ruled that prosecutors were within their rights to subpoena Al-Arian. In 2008, prosecutors in Virginia filed criminal contempt charges against Al-Arian for his refusal to testify despite a grant of immunity.

For the past five years, the case sat dormant on the court docket. Judge Leonie Brinkema questioned the government’s tactics and wondered whether prosecutors were violating the spirit of Al-Arian’s plea deal in Florida, if not the letter of it.

Prosecutors moved Friday to drop the case, and U.S. Judge Anthony Trenga quickly followed suit with a formal order of dismissal.

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