Jail terms of more than 38,000 years sought for Madrid bombing suspects

The Associated Press

MADRID, Spain -- Spanish prosecutors demanded Monday some of the stiffest sentences in the country's history for the seven lead suspects in the 2004 Madrid train bombings, seeking jail terms of more than 38,000 years for each.

The sentence request was included in the 300-page pre-trial recommendations that prosecutor Olga Sanchez presented to the National Court on Monday, chief prosecutor Javier Zaragoza told reporters.

He said the prosecutor's office was seeking large jail terms "for the intellectual culprits, the direct culprits and those needed to help to carry out in the Madrid attacks."

Among the prime suspects is Jamal Zougam, a Moroccan merchant who allegedly supplied cell phones used as detonators in the 10 backpack bombs that ripped through four crowded commuter trains on the morning of March 11, 2004.

Some 191 people died in the blasts, and hundreds were injured with many losing limbs or remaining paralyzed for life.

Zougam has said he had nothing to do with the plot. But the court indictment says witnesses have identified him as having been aboard the trains that were bombed.

The other six lead suspects mentioned in Sanchez's document are Moroccans Basel Ghalyoun, Abdelmajid Bouchar, Youssef Belhadj and Hassan el Haski, Spaniard Emilio Trashorras, accused of supplying the dynamite, and Egyptian Rabei Osman. Osman was convicted on international terrorism charges and sentenced to 10 years in prison in Italy on Monday.

In her report, Sanchez says the seven face jail terms of 30 years for each of the 191 killings and 18 years for the 1,820 attempted murders. Combined, the sentence request comes to 38,490 years for each.

The sentence petition, while demonstrating the gravity of the case, is mostly symbolic. Under Spanish law, terror convicts can face no more than 40 years in jail, since the country has neither the death penalty or provisions for life in prison without parole.

Courts routinely hand down sentences of hundreds or even thousands of years, especially against convicted members of the Basque separatist group ETA.

The other 22 people indicted in the Madrid bombings are named in Sanchez's report as belonging to or collaborating with a terrorist organization, weapons possession and other crimes. They face jail terms between four and 30 years.

Zaragoza said the prosecutor's office will call on the testimony of 134 witnesses and 67 experts, including forensic doctors and policemen, during the trial expected to begin in February or March of 2007.

Sanchez accused 12 people of having taken part directly in the execution of the Madrid bombings. Of the 12, only three will be tried. The rest are either dead or fugitives.

Seven alleged ringleaders -- including its ideological mastermind, Tunisian Serhan Ben Abdelmajid Fakhet -- blew themselves up three weeks after the attacks as police moved in on their apartment hideout in the Madrid suburb of Leganes. One policeman died in that explosion.

Sanchez also said in her petition that the attacks were inspired by a call by Osama bin Laden in 2003 to attack Western countries including Spain for their participation in the war in Iraq.

But while bin Laden may have inspired the bombers, a two-year investigation into the attacks has uncovered no evidence that al-Qaida helped plan, finance or carry out the bombings, or even knew about them beforehand.