U.S. seeks death penalty for the New York terrorist

Federal prosecutors in Manhattan demanded a death sentence from the court for a 30-year-old Uzbek citizen Sayfullo Saipov, who was accused of committing a terrorist attack in New York last October, The New York Times reports with reference to court documents.

Sayfullo Saipov was charged in the 2017 truck attack that killed eight people on a crowded Manhattan bike path.

It is worth noting that the last time the death penalty in this state was enforced in 1953 against Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, who were accused of atomic espionage in favor of the Soviet Union.

Earlier, US President Donald Trump on his Twitter page also demanded that the perpetrator of the terrorist attack in New York be sentenced to death.

Although Saipov has pleaded not guilty, his lawyers told Judge Broderick in January that the suspect would change his plea to guilty and accept a sentence of life imprisonment if the government agreed not to seek his execution.

Saipov’s lawyer, David E. Patton, who heads the federal public defender’s office in Manhattan, said he was disappointed by the attorney general’s decision.

“We think the decision to seek the death penalty rather than accepting a guilty plea to life in prison with no possibility of release will only prolong the trauma of these events for everyone involved,” he said.