Widow of Orlando Nightclub Shooter Found Not Guilty

The widow of the gunman who killed 49 people at a gay Orlando nightclub was acquitted Friday on [...]

The widow of the gunman who killed 49 people at a gay Orlando nightclub was acquitted Friday on charges of lying to the FBI and helping her husband in the June 2016 attack.

noor-salman

Noor Salman, 31, reportedly sobbed with joy when she was found not guilty of charges of obstruction of justice and providing material support to a terrorist organization, WKMG reported. Salman was married to Omar Mateen when he attacked the Pulse nightclub. Police killed him after the massacre.

"Thank you," she whispered to her attorneys.

"Noor can go home now to her son, resume her life and try to pick up the pieces from two years in jail," Salman family spokeswoman Susan Clary said, adding that the relatives were grateful for the verdict.

Salman was arrested in January 2017, months after Mateen killed 49 people and injured more than 50 others when he opened fire at Pulse the previous June.

Prosecutors argued that Salman and Mateen scouted potential targets together, including Disney World's shopping and entertainment complex, and she knew he was buying ammunition for his AR-15 in preparation for his jihadi attack. They said that she knew he had a fascination with violent jihadi videos as well as an affinity for Islamic State group websites and gave him a "green light to commit terrorism."

Defense attorneys said Salman, who was born in California to Palestinian parents, was an easily manipulated woman with a low IQ. They said she was abused by her husband, who cheated on her with other women and concealed much of his life from her.

Attorney Charles Swift said it was impossible for Salman to know about the Pulse nightclub attack because Mateen himself didn't even know he would do it until moments before the shooting because he initially intended to target the Disney Springs complex, according to prosecutors.

"It's a horrible, random, senseless killing by a monster," Swift said during closing arguments. "But it wasn't pre-planned. The importance to this case is that if he didn't know, she couldn't know."

Salman's statement to the FBI in the hours after the attack played a key role in the case and trial. In her statement, she said over "the last two years, Omar talked to me about jihad."

She also claimed Mateen didn't use the internet in their home, but prosecutors said he did. She told investigators that he had deactivated his Facebook profile in 2013, but they found that he had an active account up until the month of the shooting and was friends with his wife. She said he had only one gun when he actually had three.

She also said that he wasn't radicalized; Mateen pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group before he was killed.

Defense attorneys said the FBI coerced her statement and that she signed it because she was tired after extensive questioning and did not want to lose her young son.

Jurors asked to review her statement more closely a couple of hours into their deliberations.

Salman's attorney took the jury through the hours of her life before her husband carried out the attack. She called a friend and her uncle in California, making plans to visit with Mateen. She talked with her in-laws, ate at Applebee's and texted Mateen, who didn't respond. She later browsed Facebook, read a book and texted Mateen again.

"You know you work tomorrow," she wrote.

He responded, "You know what happened?"

She wrote, "What happened?"

Then he sent his final text: "I love you babe."

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