Moussaoui gets life

September 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui should spend his life in prison instead of being executed for his role in the hijacked airliner attacks, a US jury decided yesterday.

Moussaoui, the only person convicted in the US in connection with the deadly attacks, will be sentenced today by a federal judge.

Federal prosecutors had asked the jury to sentence Moussaoui to death. But jurors, who spent about 41 hours deliberating before reaching the verdict, were divided on whether he should be executed. Earlier this month the same jury of nine men and three women found Moussaoui eligible for the death penalty. The jury verdict followed a second, two-week phase of the sentencing trial.

The 37-year-old French citizen of Moroccan descent was arrested three weeks before the September 11 attacks and said he was meant to pilot a fifth airplane into the White House as part of the plot.

He pleaded guilty to six counts of conspiracy, three of which carried a maximum death sentence.

Moussaoui also said he had no remorse for the September 11 attacks in which about 3,000 people died.