Somali Pirate Arrives In NYC To Face Charges

Photograph of Abduhl Wal-i-Musi being escorted by the authorities near Federal Plaza by Louis Lanzano/AP

Abduhl Wal-i-Musi, the lone pirate who surrendered to the U.S. Navy after holding an American container ship captain hostage, arrived in New York last night. The Daily News reports that he "look[ed] young, gaunt and clueless about the federal charges he faces"—he will be arraigned this morning in federal court.

Wal-i-Musi was one of four pirates who tried to hijack the Maersk Alabama in the Horn of Africa. The ship's crew members were able to take back the ship, but the pirates, armed with machine guns, took Captain Richard Phillips as a hostage. Shortly Wal-i-Musi agreed to be taken to a Naval destroyer monitoring the pirates' boat, Navy Seals killed the remaining pirates and rescued Phillips. According to the Post (which calls him the "JOLLY ROGER" because he smiled at one point for photographers, sources say that the "kidnapping and other charges [he faces carry] a maximum of life in prison."

Musi's mother Adar Abdirahman Hassan, who says her son is only 16 though investigators say he is 18, told the AP that her son was drawn to piracy by "gangsters with money" and asked President Obama for help, "I appeal to President Obama to pardon my teenager; I request him to release my son or at least allow me to see him and be with him during the trial." The director of the Somali Justice Advocacy Center said the pirate's family had asked for help; Omar Jamal said, "What we have is a confused teenager, overnight thrown into the highest level of the criminal justice system in the United States out of a country where there's no law at all."

A Chicago lawyer (and Brooklyn Law grad) Michael Passman told the Daily News that it's been 100 years since the last piracy trial, adding Wal-i-Musi may have difficulties finding a lawyer, "Anyone who ever defended one of these cases has been dead for 100 years."

Contact the author of this article or email tips@gothamist.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By Jen Chung in News on April 21, 2009 9:19 AM

Comments [rss]

GREGORYABUTLER

Am I the only one who sees a little problem with an American court trying a Somalian defendant for a crime that happened in Somalian territorial waters?

Also, why was that American military supply ship in Somalian territorial waters in the first place?

Is this some kind of latter day Gulf of Tonkin Incident? [look it up on wikipedia if you don't know what that was]

Rocknrope

Bleeding heart much? Before you go spouting your uninformed claptrap, you may want to look into the fact that the Maersk Alabama was not under military contract at the time of capture, and nearly half of its cargo was comprised of relief supplies bound for Somalia.

Maybe you should go back to your issue of the Utne Reader.

Snoopy

And in this corner recently arrived from Somalia. Ari "the Pirate" Roger.

monsterzro

heard he took the Arrr train to his arraignment

ista-ista

Someone PLEASE photoshop a parrot on his shoulder. Perfect space for it on the left one. Damn these locked-down computers at work!

EastRiver

Wal-i-Musi may have difficulties finding a lawyer

Yeah, lawyers hate the spotlight. I have no doubt at least one lawyer somewhere in this country is brushing up on maritime law while dreaming of appearance on Larry King. Alan Dershowitz can handle the appeal and write a book about it.

jaycjay

What the person quoted actually said was that he "may have trouble finding a lawyer familiar with piracy laws," because every lawyer who has been involved in a piracy case "has been dead for 100 years."

You're right, plenty of lawyers will no doubt be happy to represent him, and represent themselves on the talk show circuit.

Mr Mel

I'll bet that his story has a few murders in it. If the highjacking had worked would he have shared in the payoff?

jaycjay

"I'll bet that his story has a few murders in it."

Why? From everything I've read, only two crew members have been killed by Somalian pirates: one hostage killed in 2007 because a ransom hadn't been paid and one crewman killed in 2008 during the takeover of a vessel.

Guest

From the photo, it looks like he's got Captain Jack Sparrow's walk down pat.

valeriob

Ya best start believing in pirate stories, yar in one!

firewire

make the wee scallywag walk the plank.

fakenewyorker

he looks like a starved p. diddy.

Snoopy

That demon rum made him do it. Normally he works at a retirement home helping to put his kid sister through college.

glennQNYC

A new Octomom!

How long do you think it will take until you see one of the weekly lifestyle magazines put Wal-i-Musi on the cover, with something like "Despair in Africa" across his headshot?

ides_of_march

Where's his parrot?

Bernie Madoff-Goetz

I think it shit on the shoulder of that guy on the far left and they had to put it down.

hotstepper

they appear to have great dental care in somalia, his teeth are nice and white.

Tar_Baby

I think it's more noticeable due to the contrast. It's hard to tell when he ends and the night begins.

GREGORYABUTLER

David Duke called - you're late for the crossburning!

Damn - and they say this kid can get a fair trial in this jurisdiction!

With people like you in the jury pool, I think not!

ides_of_march

I sense a book and movie deal in his future.

chuzzlewit

do we still have any gibbets lying around?

Huffy6241

Nice to see that moms in Somalia use "But he's a good kid" thing too...

Felix Hoenikker

You beat me to it.

I suppose modern destroyers don't have yardarms. Shame.

Politburo

They do. Dunno if you could hang someone from there, though.

In any case, the Constitution gives Congress the power to make laws punishing piracy. A military commission may be possible, one was used in WWII, but those circumstances were obviously different since the actors in the conflict were clearly defined nation-states.

BongoBoy

Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

CubanB

What in the hell do they have him wearing? He looks like an MC Hammer back up dancer.

CR

That's a US Gov't Issued Snuggie. It's just like a regular Snuggie, but it costs $2500.

Rocknrope

Maybe his defense will be that he was too legit to quit.

mrguy

Please Abduhl don't hurt 'em.

jibbly

Is it wrong that I find this ridiculously funny?

ericf

no. It's hilarious. and to think that anyone would ask for sympathy for this guy?

What's really funny is that he probably though that he was some kind of bad-ass gangbanger, and now his head is spinning.

GREGORYABUTLER

Actually, he was a poor Somalian fisherman's son.

The reason we have these Somali "pirates" in the first place is because, after the collapse of the Somalian government in 1991, Italian fishing trawlers began overfishing Somali waters and Italian sludge tankers began dumping nuclear and chemical waste in Somalian waters.

There was no Somalian Navy or Coast Guard to stop them - and, after all, Somalia WAS a former Italian colony - so they just did what they wanted.

Somalian fishermen armed themselves, and began attacking these ships.

They called themselves the Volunteer Coast Guard of Somalia - and although they later branched out into piracy, that's how they got started.

Sorry I had to spoil your racist "gangbanger" fantasy with the actual true story!

Chelly

Compared to Somalia, this dude hit the jackpot. His dream came true.

GREGORYABUTLER

Racism much?

freddynyc

Exactly, being holed in the pen sure beats living in a hole in the desert. Before you know it, he'll be selling pirated DVDs on Broadway in a couple...