Mohammed Hazra Khan, an Indian American man who tried to go to Syria with his teenaged brother and sister to join the Islamic State terror organization has been sentenced in Chicago to 40 months in prison, media reports stated.
With his conviction on November 19th, Mohammed Hazra Khan, 21, became the first person of Indian origin to be convicted and sentenced in the U.S. for Islamic State connections. The sentencing hits the news just after the victory of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, who had called for intensive investigation of Muslim immigrants and, controversially, suggesting that if necessary their immigration should be stopped temporarily till a mechanism for heightened scrutiny was in place.
Federal Judge John J. Tharp sentenced Khan, who had admitted in court last year to the charges of providing support to the Islamic State and trying to go abroad to join it, Mary B. McCord, the Acting Assistant Attorney General for National Security, said in a statement.
Khan was arrested by anti-terrorism officers two years ago while trying to leave the U.S. from Chicago’s O’Hare Airport, she said. He was 19 years old at the time of his arrest. Khan’s brother, who was 16 years old in 2014, and sister, who was 17, were also stopped at the airport but did not face any charges and were let go after officials questioned them.
Khan is an American citizen born in New York. But his family had immigrated from India and lived in the Chicago area. Last year, his mother had publicly asked ISIS leaders to “leave our children alone” and asserted: “The venom spewed by these groups and the violence committed by them find no support in the Quran and are completely at odds with our Islamic faith.”
