Hadi Matar, 28, was convicted Wednesday of federal terrorism charges in the 2022 stabbing of author Salman Rushdie, with a jury finding him guilty of all charges including engaging in an act of transnational terrorism.
Matar is already serving a 25-year New York state prison sentence on an attempted murder conviction in the August 2022 attack on an amphitheater stage. The federal conviction carries a potential life sentence.
Rushdie, who was about to speak on writers’ safety, was slashed 15 times in front of a stunned audience and lost the sight in his right eye.
The charges Matar faced in the federal trial stemmed from alleged links to Hezbollah.
Matar repeatedly broached the fatwa with contacts in messaging apps in 2021 and 2022, according to exhibits shown in court, with the messages showing Matar fuming that he felt Rushdie had attacked Islam and, by surviving, emboldened others to insult the faith.
Prosecutors said that photos in Matar’s New Jersey bedroom and on his computer indicated his support for Hezbollah, which the U.S. has designated a terrorist organization.
Matar aimed to fulfill the fatwa and “wanted everyone to know he was doing this for Hezbollah,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Timothy Lynch said in an opening statement July 22.
The defense maintained throughout that prosecutors had not proven Matar’s intent.
Defense lawyer Nathaniel Barone countered that the government had no proof of what was in Matar’s head. In his opening, Barone urged jurors to ask themselves: “What was Hadi Matar’s intent?”
Speaking to The Associated Press outside of court, Barone said the biggest challenge facing prosecutors is determining Matar’s state of mind at the time of the attack, noting “Certainly, they can’t do that demonstrably. There’s no facts. There’s no hard evidence.”
Matar declined to take the stand during the federal trial.
Hadi Matar’s lawyer told the court that the 28-year-old — who already has been convicted of state-level attempted murder charges — wouldn’t take the stand at his trial, with attorney Nathaniel Barone saying “At this time, the defense rests.”
Rushdie testified about the violent attack and its aftermath.
Four years after being stabbed on an amphitheater stage, Salman Rushdie sat across a courtroom from his convicted attacker Thursday and told jurors about the ambush that nearly killed him, recalling feeling what he thought was a punch under his chin, then feeling blood coming from his neck, and soon “I was on the stage, lying down, with an enormous pool of blood all around me.”
A Buffalo federal court jury watched Rushdie fixedly as he testified — and at one point removed his glasses to show his now sightless right eye.
During cross-examination, Rushdie addressed questions about the defendant’s motives.
When defense lawyer Nathaniel Barone asked whether Rushdie believed the defendant had ties to terrorism, the author replied: “I had no knowledge, but I had my suspicions,” noting that Iran’s late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued the 1989 fatwa calling for Rushdie to be killed over “The Satanic Verses.”
Evidence presented to jurors included electronic communications Matar exchanged.
The messages showed Matar initially talked about wanting to “expose” Rushdie, then about taking his life, with Matar writing in a private note to himself: “We need to kill him ASAP,” according to Lynch.
The prosecutor said Matar framed the planned killing as part of what he considered a jihad, or holy war, and by spring 2022, the electronic chats showed Matar wrote that he had discerned where Rushdie lived and was tracking his public appearances, eventually pointing out his scheduled August 2022 talk at the Chautauqua Institution.
In the viral moment that preceded this federal conviction, on August 12, 2022, Matar rushed onto the stage at the Chautauqua Institution in southwestern New York where the acclaimed author was about to deliver a lecture on writers’ safety. Matar stabbed Rushdie approximately 15 times, delivering cuts to his neck, body and head. After being airlifted to a hospital, Rushdie eventually lost sight in one eye. Another speaker — Henry Reese, who runs a nonprofit for writers in exile — also received injuries, including a stab wound.
Audience members quickly subdued the attacker. Several onlookers at the amphitheater worked swiftly to neutralize Matar, including Henry Reese, the man scheduled to interview Rushdie on stage, who was stabbed in the face as a result.
Matar now faces sentencing in the federal case.