Zacarias Moussaoui, the French Muslim and accused in the 9/11 attacks will die with a whimper not as a martyr and in a great big bang of glory. As per the verdict of the jury, the court awarded the life punishment to the hard-core terrorist. The case is the highlight of the justice in a democracy. Notwithstanding the criticism of the jury and the justice system by a good number of American citizens, about which the jury and the presiding officer of the court must be apprehensive, the law prevailed, reported the New York Times.



Because Judge,was required to sentence him to life in prison after the jury’s decision on Wednesday, there was little suspense, but an abundance of drama. It began when the Judge asked whether there were any family members of victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the audience who wanted to be heard.



Rosemary Dillard, whose husband died on American Airlines Flight 77 when it crashed into the Pentagon, rose from the audience. Walking to a lectern a few feet from Moussaoui, she looked at him and said: “I want you, Moussaoui, to know how you wrecked my life. You wrecked my career. You took the most important person in my life from me.”As Moussaoui stared back impassively, she continued, “I hope that you sit in that jail without seeing the sky, without seeing the sun, without any contact with the world and that your name never comes up in any newspaper again during the rest of my life.”



She was followed to the lectern by Abraham Scott, who lost his wife at the Pentagon on Sept. 11. Mr. Scott told Moussaoui that “you and all the rest of your colleagues will not deter this country from continuing to enjoy the freedom that it has for the past 200 years.” He added that he was confident Osama bin Laden would eventually be captured and face justice.



Finally, Lisa Dolan told the court that her husband, a naval officer who died at the Pentagon, had served his country to ensure that it maintained the freedom to conduct fair and open trials like the one just concluded. “There is still one final judgment day,” Ms. Dolan concluded, staring at Moussaoui.



Moussaoui then took the witness stand after the Judge invited him to speak before he was sentenced. He said he wanted to respond to the family members who had just spoken.”The first one say that I destroy her life and she lost her husband,” said Moussaoui, whose native language is French. “Maybe one day she can think how many people the C.I.A. have destroyed their life.”



He said Americans had “an amount of hypocrisy which is beyond any belief,” adding, “Your humanity is a very selected humanity - only you suffer, only you feel.” concluding: “God curse America and save Osama bin Laden. You’ll never get him. You have branded me a terrorist or criminal.”



In fact, he said, he was a soldier in the Islamic cause, and “I fight for my belief.”He said Americans had forfeited an opportunity to use the trial to discover why people like himself and Mohamed Atta, the pilot of one of the hijacked planes of Sept. 11, “have so much hatred for you.” Moussaoui, who was arrested on immigration charges three weeks before Sept. 11, pleaded guilty last year to conspiracy in the attacks.



As he left the courtroom, Moussaoui repeated his earlier claim that he would be released by President Bush before he left the White House. “In your dreams!” Lisa Beilke shouted from the spectator section. Mrs. Beilke’s husband died in the Pentagon.



Officials said Moussaoui would soon be transferred to the federal prison in Florence, Colo., used to house the inmates requiring the greatest security. A prison expert testifying for the defense during the trial said that at the prison Moussaoui would have no contact with others and would be spoken to only sporadically by guards, probably causing him to deteriorate quickly.