YouTube is normally considered a great venue for entertainment. In this case, it cost a university student his freedom.
By MITCH STACY
Associated Press Writer
TAMPA, Fla. — An Egyptian student attending a Florida university was sentenced to 15 years in prison Thursday for making a YouTube video showing would-be terrorists how to turn a remote-control toy into a bomb detonator.
U.S. District Judge Steven D. Merryday said the public needed to be protected from 27-year-old Ahmed Abdellatif Sherif Mohamed, who made the video “to empower others through his teaching to deliver death, destruction and, at the very least, panic.”
Merryday handed the maximum sentence to the former University of South Florida graduate student, brushing aside his attorneys’ pleas for leniency and the minimum eight-year sentence.
“This is an intelligent man who made a very bad mistake,” one his attorneys, Linda Moreno, said afterward. “This is a sad day.”
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