A Virginia federal jury found 24-year-old former university student Ahmed Omar Abu Ali guilty last Tuesday on terrorism-related charges stemming from a stint as a student in Saudi Arabia, where prosecutors say he allied himself with al-Qaeda and planned to assassinate President Bush in 2003.

Abu Ali, a U.S. citizen, was an electrical engineering major at this university from fall 1999 until he withdrew midway through the spring 2000 semester.

The jury returned guilty verdicts on all nine counts – including providing support and materials to a foreign terrorist organization and conspiring to assassinate the president – after deliberating for two and a half days. Prosecutors said a taped confession jurors saw during the three-week trial showed a young man eager to destroy President Bush, while Abu Ali’s lawyers say the confession is false and the result of 47 days of interrogation and torture by the Mubahith, a Saudi government security force.

“It was a process,” said Ashraf Nubani, an attorney for Abu Ali. “They would sit and interrogate him for hours starting in the evening and going to the morning of the next day.”

Prosecutors could not be reached for comment by press time.

Nubani said marks on Abu Ali’s back exhibited during the trial show he was brutally whipped. A doctor and a psychiatrist testified the marks showed evidence of torture, but a doctor testified for the government that the marks did not show signs of whipping.

In a statement, U.S. Attorney Paul McNulty said “the evidence presented in this case firmly established Abu Ali as a dangerous terrorist who posed a grave threat to our national security … It serves as a clear warning to all that terrorists can and will be brought to the bar of justice.”

The prosecution also presented testimony from Abu Ali’s interrogators that said he confessed as soon as they showed him evidence from al-Qaeda members.

Nubani said he will appeal the verdict because the evidence the jury used to convict came from information gathered by the Mubahith after they tortured Abu Ali.

“As a constitutional issue – the idea you would be arrested and tortured in a foreign country and have the evidence used against you in a courtroom here,” Nubani said.

Abu Ali will be sentenced Feb. 17 and faces life in prison.

Nubani also said it is very difficult for Muslims to receive fair treatment in terrorism-related cases in the post-Sept. 11 culture – especially in eastern Virginia because of its small minority population and proximity to the nation’s capital.

“People are still afraid,” he said. “They believe the [Bush] administration is protecting us from terror and the evil of attacks against the nation.”

After viewing footage of the confession, juror Nancy Ramsden told The Associated Press she was struck by images of Abu Ali appearing to laugh and imitate the use of a gun.

“It was very telling,” she said. “It was almost a sort of a joke for him.”

Nubani said the images were the result of a script Abu Ali’s captors prepared for him and that Abu Ali was exhausted and psychologically malleable.

“I can’t see how he wouldn’t live his confession,” he said. “He was obviously very tired on the script. He looked up at the interrogator and asked, ‘Is that OK?'”

Abu Ali did not testify at the trial because Nubani said he gave a detailed account of his torture at an October suppression hearing and did not want to relive the experience.

“Everyone in the courtroom was crying,” he said. “No one denied his story and it was as clear as day. It was heart-wrenching, yet the judge said he didn’t think he was tortured. Why would you go through the pain again only to have a jury say, ‘We don’t believe you?'”

The Associated Press contributed to this article.

Contact reporter Kate Campbell at campbelldbk@gmail.com.