Judge Lenient With Civil Rights Lawyer

Former civil rights lawyer Lynne Stewart exits Manhattan federal court following her sentencing, Monday, Oct. 16, 2006, in New York. The firebrand civil rights lawyer who has defended Black Panthers and anti-war radicals was sentenced Monday to nearly 2 years in prison, far less than the 30 years prosecutors wanted, for helping an imprisoned terrorist sheik communicate with his followers on the outside. (AP Photo/ Louis Lanzano) (Louis Lanzano - AP)

NEW YORK -- Civil rights lawyer Lynne Stewart arrived at her sentencing packed for prison. With medication, books and a pair of sweat pants, she was prepared to begin a stay that could have stretched for 30 years.

Instead, Stewart walked out of the courtroom unshackled, free pending appeal of a 28-month sentence after a judge took into account her career of standing up for the most unpopular clients.

The 67-year-old, convicted of helping a jailed terrorist sheik communicate with his disciples, smiled through tears as the judge announced the sentence Monday. Later, she hugged family and supporters and was handed two bouquets of red roses as she walked out of the courthouse.

"This is a great victory against an overreaching government," she told dozens of supporters outside the lower Manhattan courthouse after winning extraordinary leniency from U.S. District Judge John G. Koeltl.

The judge rejected demands by the government that Stewart be sentenced to 30 years in prison for convictions of conspiracy to provide material support to terrorist organizations, making false statements and defrauding the government.

Prosecutors had blistered Stewart's acts as "egregious, flagrant abuse of her profession, abuse that amounted to material support to a terrorist group."

The sentence came after a year in which Stewart was treated for breast cancer and diabetes, conditions the judge said would make it difficult for Stewart in prison.

The judge said there was ample evidence she had smuggled messages between her client, Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman, and senior members of an Egyptian-based terrorist organization _ messages he said could have had "potentially lethal consequences." But the judge noted no one was harmed as a result.

The federal government once hailed the case as a major win against terrorism, and U.S. Attorney Michael J. Garcia said he was disappointed by Stewart's sentence, as well as the 20-month prison term given to Mohamed Yousry, an Arabic interpreter, and the 24-year sentence imposed on Ahmed Abdel Sattar, a U.S. postal worker. He said his office will consider an appeal.

Prosecutors argued Sattar should be imprisoned for life and Yousry for 20 years for their roles in helping Abdel-Rahman convey his message, despite special measures imposed to cut him off from the world as he served his life sentence for terrorism.

Abdel-Rahman was convicted in plots to assassinate Egypt's president and blow up five New York landmarks, including the U.N. building and the Lincoln and Holland tunnels. Prosecutors have said Stewart and the co-defendants helped spread Abdel-Rahman's call to kill those who did not subscribe to his extremist interpretation of Islamic law.

Although the judge called Stewart's crimes "extraordinarily severe criminal conduct," he cited more than three decades of dedication by Stewart to poor, disadvantaged and unpopular clients that had left her destitute even though she once worked on more than 70 cases at a time.