India said Friday it was disappointed by a U.S. jury’s verdict on Chicago businessman Tahawwur Hussain Rana, who was found guilty on two terror counts—providing material support to a terror conspiracy and to a Pakistan militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba—but acquitted on the charge of helping to plot the Mumbai 2008 terror attacks.
“It may be recalled that evidence was produced in the U.S. court that David Headley had advised Rana of his assignment to scout potential targets in India,” said a statement from India’s home ministry. “We are, therefore, disappointed that Rana was acquitted on the count of conspiracy to provide material support to the Mumbai terrorist attacks.”
The statement said India’s National Investigation Agency, which was set up after the Mumbai attacks, will examine the documents and evidence from the U.S. case before deciding whether to try to prosecute David Coleman Headley, who was the key prosecution witness in the case, and Mr. Rana in India.
It suggested that a prosecution in India—which does not have a jury system—could result in a different verdict.
“It must be remembered that Rana was tried in a U.S. court in accordance with U.S. law,” said the home ministry. “Criminal trials in the U.S. are jury trials and there are special rules governing such jury trials.”
It’s possible that the verdict may again reopen old wounds between India and the U.S. over Mr. Headley, who was arrested in Chicago in 2009. Some in India have questioned whether the U.S. should have shared the intelligence it had on Mr. Headley, a U.S. citizen born to an American mother and a Pakistani father, with India sooner. Ahead of U.S. President Barack Obama’s trip to India in November, India’s home minister, Palaniappan Chidambaram, had to respond to repeated queries from the press on revelations U.S. federal agents received a tip before the attacks that Mr. Headley was training with Lashkar-e-Taiba, the militant outfit that orchestrated the terrorist rampage.
Mr. Headley, who pleaded guilty in March last year on 12 terror-related counts, had admitted to scouting out locations for the Mumbai attacks, and testified in the Rana case that his friend assisted him. In return, U.S. prosecutors agreed not to seek the death penalty.
This could make it difficult for authorities in India, where the death penalty is on the books, to seek his extradition.
India previously tried the lone surviving gunman of the 10 terrorists who waged a three-day attack on the country’s financial hub, firing on people at the main train station, two five-star hotels, a tourist café and a Jewish center, killing more than 160 people. In May last year he was convicted on dozens of charges and sentenced to death. He is presently in jail in Mumbai.
India
