Lodi Terrorism Trial—Umer Hayat Guilty Plea

Umer Hayat, whose trial ended in a mistrial over a month ago, has agreed to plead guilty to lesser charges rather than go through another trial.^[1] Rather than being retried on the two counts of lying about terrorism that he was charged with, Mr. Hayat has pleaded guilty to “lying to customs agents by denying he was carrying $28,000 when he took a trip to Pakistan several years ago.”^[2] The US Attorney’s Office, in the plea agreement, agreed to recommend a sentence of 11 months, the amount of time already served, along with three years of supervised release.^[3] Mr. Hayat will be sentenced on August 18, but, as we have pointed out before, the ultimate sentence is to be determined by US District Court Judge Garland E. Burrell Jr.^[4]

After Mr. Hayat’s trial ended in a deadlocked jury, the government announced they would retry him on the charges, but since the jury split 7-5 and 6-6 on the two separate counts, it decided that a conviction would be difficult to obtain.^[5]

The customs charges arise out of a April 19, 2003 trip to Pakistan when “customs officers stopped the Hayat family at Washington-Dulles International Airport.”^[6] When asked if he was carrying any money, Mr. Hayat said no, but when notified that he must declare amounts over $10,000, Mr. Hayat showed the agent two envelopes with $5,000 each in them; his family was then searched where $10,000 was found on Hamid Hayat and $8,053 was found on Umer Hayat’s wife.^[7] A fine of $2,000 was assessed that the remainder of the money was returned to the family; community members in Lodi signed affidavits declaring that the money was intended for family members in Pakistan.^[8]

It was during that trip that prosecutors allege that Hamid Hayat attended Pakistani training camps.^[9]

Mr. Hayat pleaded guilty to one count of making false statements under 18 U.S.C. § 1001,^[10] and the government would have had to prove the following beyond a reasonable doubt:

1. he made a false statement in a matter within the jurisdiction of a federal agency;
2. he acted willfully; and
3. the statement was material to the federal agency’s acts or decisions.

Cases like this are a perfect example of the way that federal prosecutors will often leave certain charges off the table for later use. As the jury forewoman in Umer Hayat’s trial, Debra Kiriu, told the Lodi News-Sentinel “the jury was never told of the $28,000, even thought the customs agent traveled from Washington, D.C. for the trial,” testifying for only eight minutes.^[11]

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[1] Layla Bohm, Umer Hayat Agrees to Plea Deal, Lodi News-Sentinel, May 31, 2006.
[2] Id.
[3] Id.
[4] Id.
[5] Id.
[6] Id.
[7] Id.
[8] Id.
[9] Don Thompson, Lodi Man Pleads Guilty to Lesser Charge in Terror Case, Avoids Prison, AP (via News-Review), June 1, 2006.
[10] United States v. Hayat, No. S-05-240 (E.D. Cal. 2006), Plea Agreement at 2.
[11] Bohm, supra note 1.