University student lands behind bars for promoting terror ideology

AMMAN — The Court of Cassation has upheld a March State Security Court (SSC) ruling sentencing a university student to six years in prison after convicting him of promoting terrorist ideology and attempting to join armed groups in May 2018.

The defendant, who was studying civil engineering at Tafileh University, was convicted of promoting Daesh ideology and attempting to join the terror group, and received the maximum punishment.

The defendant was arrested at Queen Alia International Airport upon returning from Iran on June 20, 2018.

Court documents said that at the end of 2017, the defendant started following the Daesh terror group’s announcements on social media and would like posts on their social media pages.

 “The defendant was convinced that Daesh had the right to be in Iraq and Syria, so he decided to spread its ideology,” court papers said.

The defendant created several fake Facebook accounts and used them to spread news related to the terror organisation “to gain more followers and sympathisers”, court transcripts said.

“The defendant then decided to join the group, and started communicating with its leaders and followers via social media,” court papers added.

The defendant contacted a man who “encouraged him to join Daesh by travelling to Afghanistan via Iran”.

“The defendant agreed and sent his passport papers to the man he was in contact with to help him travel to Iran,” court papers said.

Upon arriving in Iran, the defendant was arrested at the airport after an immigration officer became suspicious of his reasons for travelling to the country, court papers added.

The defendant remained under detention in Iran for questioning for 40 days and then was deported to Jordan, where he was arrested, court papers added.

The SSC general prosecutor asked the higher court to uphold the sentence, stating that the SSC had followed the proper procedures while sentencing the defendant.

The defendant, however, contested the SSC ruling through his lawyer, claiming that he “had no intention of joining any armed groups in Iran”.

The lawyer also claimed that the SSC prosecutor failed to present “any solid evidence that would implicate his client with the charges”.

“My client did not use social media and was subjected to duress and torture in order to confess,” the lawyer said.

The lawyer also stated that the SSC disregarded the witnesses who testified that “the defendant was not an extremist-leaning individual and was supporting his family”. 

The lawyer also asked the court for a reduced sentence, since “my client is in his final year of university and imprisonment will result in him losing his university degree”.

However, the higher court ruled that the SSC had followed the proper procedures and the defendant deserved the verdict he had received.

“It was clear that the defendant confessed willingly to the charges and that the authorities’ investigation procedures were correct and within the law,” the Court of Cassation said.

The Court of Cassation judges were Mohammad Ibrahim, Naji Zu’bi, Yassin Abdullat, Saeed Mugheid and Majid Azab.