"But if they’re not going to allow armed security, I think we should be able to protect ourselves with small arms." "We need some protection aboard our vessels and having armed security is very good, if they would put armed security on every ship," he said. He said U.S.-flagged ships need to be armed. However, the court found that Muse was over 18 at the time of the hijackings.Ĭolin Wright said he has returned to his work as a sailor, but still does not feel safe.
Muse’s attorneys contended that extreme poverty led him to piracy, and that he was still in his mid-teens. Prior to his sentencing, Muse told the court through a translator that he was "very sorry," and asked forgiveness from those he had harmed. Muse had pleaded guilty in May to six counts related to hijacking maritime vessels, kidnapping and hostage-taking. And a sentence of 33, nearly 34 years, seems like a fairly short one for that." "He’s also responsible for his three companions being killed. "Seems like a very short time for the pain and trauma that he and his companions have caused," said Wright. Colin Wright, who had been third officer on the ship and spoke at the hearing, later told reporters that the sentence was not too harsh. Navy snipers shot and killed his three accomplices, rescuing Phillips. Muse, whom prosecutors said was the leader, allegedly fired an AK-47 assault rifle at the captain, Richard Phillips, and ordered him to stop the ship.
District Judge Loretta Preska, saying Muse and his accomplices appeared to "relish their most depraved acts of physical and psychological violence," said a longer sentence was needed to deter other pirates.įollowing takeovers of two other ships, Muse and three accomplices climbed aboard the Maersk Alabama on April 8, 2009. Muse’s lawyers had sought the minimum, more lenient sentence of 27 years. A federal judge in New York has sentenced Somali pirate Abduwali Muse to 33 years and nine months in prison for hijacking a container ship in the Indian Ocean, taking the captain hostage, and for his role in two earlier ship hijackings.Ībduwali Abdiqadir Muse was sentenced to nearly 34 years in prison in an emotional hearing that included testimony from a survivor of the 2009 hijacking of the Maersk Alabama, an American-flagged container ship, off the coast of Somalia.
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