Moussaoui jury ends third day without verdict

Jurors in the Zacarias Moussaoui case completed a third day of deliberations today without deciding whether the September 11 conspirator should be executed or imprisoned for life.

After six and a quarter hours work today, the nine men and three women have deliberated for 16 hours over three days in Alexandria, Virginia. They are to return tomorrow.

They have asked only one question – a request on Tuesday for a dictionary that US District Judge Leonie Brinkema denied.

She explained that giving them a dictionary would be like placing extraneous evidence in the jury room. She said they could submit a written question if they need specific definitions.

The jury has only two choices: death or life in prison without possibility of release. If jurors cannot reach a unanimous decision, Brinkema will automatically sentence him to life.

Earlier this month the jury found the 37-year-old Frenchman of Moroccan descent eligible for execution.

Although Moussaoui was in jail on immigration charges on September 11, the jury ruled that lies he told federal agents in the month before 9/11 kept them from identifying and stopping some of the hijackers.

Moussaoui pleaded guilty in April 2005 to conspiring with al Qaida to fly jetliners into US buildings but he denied – as he had for four years – any role in September 11.

At his guilty plea, he said he was to fly a 747 aircraft into the White House at some later date if the US refused to release a radical Egyptian sheikh imprisoned for other terrorist crimes.

During the trial, Moussaoui stunned the courtroom by testifying for the first time that he was to have hijacked a fifth plane on September 11 and flown it into the White House.