Sudan orders four hanged for murder of U.S. official

By Khalid Abdel Aziz

KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Four Sudanese men on Wednesday were condemned to hang for killing a U.S. aid official and his driver in Khartoum, and a fifth man was jailed.

John Granville of the U.S. Agency for International Development was the first U.S. government official killed in Khartoum in more than three decades in a crime that sent shockwaves through the capital's expatriate community.

Granville, 33, from near Buffalo, New York, and his driver, Abdelrahman Abbas Rahama, 39, were shot as they returned from New Year's celebrations in the early hours of January 1, 2008.

"We sentence the first four defendants to death by hanging," Judge Sayed Ahmed al-Badri said as the guilty verdicts on their murder charges were announced amid tight security.

A fifth defendant, who admitted helping some men buy guns, was sentenced to two years in jail on weapons charges.

In earlier hearings, prosecution lawyers and witnesses described them as "religious extremists" who had plotted to kill Americans they blamed for the introduction of international peacekeepers into Sudan's Darfur region.

The four defendants condemned to hang had denied murdering Granville, saying videotaped confessions shown to the court were extracted under torture.

The U.S. Embassy in Khartoum urged its citizens to stay away from the downtown court, warning that a group called "al Qaeda in the Land between the Two Niles" had mentioned Granville's murder in a statement and threatened to kill more Americans.

"I believe the guilty verdicts handed down today are an important step in bringing justice for John Granville and Abdelrahman Abbas Rahama," U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in a statement.

MOTHER'S LETTER

The verdict was greeted by cheers of "God is Greatest, long live justice" by Rahama's family, who had asked for a death sentence in line with Islamic law that gives families of murder victims a say in the sentencing.

Lawyers representing Granville's mother, Jane, read out a letter saying she preferred the killers be jailed for life for their crimes, but that was not presented as a possibility.

"It is with a heavy heart that I have to conclude that I am left with no other option. The death penalty is the only sentence that will protect others from those who took my beloved son's life," read the statement, seen by Reuters.

Jane Granville said her son spent his last minutes alive in the hospital repeatedly asking doctors what had happened to Rahama.

"It was such a privilege to watch my only son grow into the unselfish humanitarian he became," she wrote.