Massachusetts’ WBUR: Muslim who plotted to behead Pamela Geller “may be an emblem of the new normal”

The new normal? Really? Muslims plotting to behead people for violating sharia blasphemy laws is the new normal? Only if our capitulation to sharia continues and becomes complete. The enemedia set all this in motion in the wake of the Danish cartoons controversy, when instead of standing for the freedom of speech and reprinting the Muhammad cartoons over which Muslims were rioting and killing, they surrendered, and submitted to jihadi intimidation.

Then they did it again in the wake of my Muhammad Art Exhibit and Cartoon Contest in Garland, Texas. After jihadis attacked the event, they blamed me, as if the jihad attack, the first ISIS attack on American soil, was my fault, for drawing Muhammad and angering Muslims. Even conservatives who should have known better, including Bill O’Reilly, joined in the chorus of condemnation.

And now we hear that Muslim plots to behead those who stand for free speech are the “new normal.” And they are — thanks to the enemies of freedom on the left. Find out more about this in my book Fatwa: Hunted in America.

“2 Jurors Reflect On Verdict In Trial Of Everett Man Convicted Of ISIS Plot,” by David Boeri, WBUR, November 16, 2017:

Members of the jury that convicted an Everett man last month of plotting with ISIS to commit terrorism in America said they found it easy to reach their verdicts.

After four weeks of testimony, it took the jury only a few hours to find David Wright guilty of all charges against him.

The judge in the case initially refused to release the jurors’ names, but changed his mind as a result of legal arguments made by WBUR. Two jurors then spoke to WBUR about what they learned throughout the course of the trial.

‘We Didn’t Look At Anything That Had To Do With Our Feelings’

After weeks of testimony, hundreds of exhibits and a relentless assault of hate speech, ISIS propaganda, violent ideology and graphic video to match, Rachel Haddock, the forewoman of the jury, said the trial had changed her.

“I have to say we didn’t look at anything that had to do with our feelings,” she said. “We looked at the evidence, and we followed what the judge instructed us to do.”

Haddock described the towering defendant as “pathetic.” One thing Wright and his two co-conspirators had in common was this: They lived with their mothers.

Wright lived in a basement, a 532-pound man who spent 10 to 12 hours a day on a couch playing video games and surfing online as a self-styled scholar and jihadi warrior. At trial, he claimed he was harmless.

“Although I do believe that he regrets his decisions, I also believe that he was becoming extremely radicalized, and he was moving toward something that could have been extremely tragic,” Haddock said.

The plot he was convicted of planning was the beheading of Pamela Geller, a controversial blogger who sponsored a cartoon contest to make fun of the Prophet Mohammed.

Haddock’s fellow juror, Steve Bowman, said at first look, Wright could be just another guy.

“If you saw him on the train or the bus, you would have no impression other than, ‘oh, normal guy,’ ” Bowman said.

But as Bowman sat in the jury box, he formed a different impression.

“You read in your papers, or news or radio, and you think, ‘oh, that can’t really happen! How can people do this?’ But then to be sitting there, it’s like ‘oh my god, this is real.’ ”

When he took the stand in his own defense, Wright impressed the jurors as intelligent and well-spoken. He described his conduct as role-playing in a fantasy world. Like the video game “Mortal Kombat,” Wright claimed it wasn’t real, and he intended no harm.

Bowman said when Wright took the stand, however, he did not find his testimony credible.

“Minimal, minimal credibility,” Bowman said. “I think it was all coaching. He got caught, and I was not buying it.”

As calm as Wright was, the jurors believed he was well-rehearsed.

They gave much more weight to the substantial evidence that Wright had crossed the line from fantasy to reality. The crucial evidence, the two jurors said, were the audiotapes recorded by FBI agents who had been monitoring the three co-conspirators for months.

‘He Clearly Had A Choice’

On the morning of June 2, 2015, Wright’s uncle, Usaamah Rahim, tells Wright he doesn’t want to wait to behead Geller, he wants to instead “go after those boys in blue.”

The jurors say that in that moment, Wright did not tell his uncle that this was fantasy. He failed to try to stop him.

“He clearly had a choice to stop his uncle from moving forward with his plan to attack the police,” Haddock said.

“He didn’t say ‘time out.’ You know, ‘we’re joking,’ ” Bowman said.

“He did nothing,” Haddock added. “In fact, he encouraged him and said he would receive his martyrdom.”

The consequences were real — as was Wright’s intent, say the two jurors. And that undercut Wright’s contention that he was play-acting in a fantasy world.

Forewarned of Rahim’s intentions, an FBI agent and a police officer approached him in a parking lot in Roslindale. A recording revealed that Rahim then pulled out a knife — the knife that was initially purchased to behead Geller. After asking him to drop it, Rahim refuses and says, “Why don’t you shoot me?” The police fired, killing him.

On another recorded phone call Wright would later lie to his uncle’s family saying he had not spoken with Rahim and didn’t know anything about what happened.

“He had testified that his intention wasn’t for anything to ever be real, but if you look at amount of activity that he had to push this forward, it was just so overwhelming,” Haddock said….

Wright may be an emblem of the new normal. He’ll be sentenced next month.