Denmark sentences cartoonist attacker to 9 years

A Danish court on Friday sentenced a Somali man to nine years in prison followed by expulsion for trying to kill a cartoonist whose 2005 drawing of the Prophet Mohammad provoked Muslim outrage around the world. The court in the city of Aarhus sentenced Muhudiin Mohamed Geele to be expelled from Denmark and banned from the country for life after serving his sentence, a police official said. Geele, 29, broke into the home of cartoonist Kurt Westergaard with an axe and a sharp knife on New Year's Day last year. He was convicted on Thursday of an attempted act of terrorism and attempted manslaughter. The court said in a statement the attack was an attempt to frighten the population and destabilise society and thus constituted an act of terror. From September 2009 to the time of the attack, the convicted man sought information on the Internet many times about militant Islamic groups' opinions on the Mohammad drawings and Westergaard, the court said in the statement. The prosecutor had asked for a 12-year sentence, but the defence lawyer had argued for no more than six years and said he would lodge an appeal, Danish media reported. Geele had pleaded not guilty to the terror and manslaughter charges, and said he had entered the cartoonist's home intending only to frighten him. He was acquitted of another manslaughter charge, brought because he threw his axe at a police officer who arrived to arrest him, but was convicted of assaulting the officer. On Jan. 1 last year, Westergaard, 75, became aware of the man trying to break into his home and fled to a secure "panic room". He then alerted the police and was unhurt after police wounded the intruder and detained him. During the trial, the court heard testimony about how the man wielded his axe, first to break into the house and then to try to chop through the steel-reinforced door of Westergaard's bathroom -- the secure room of his house. Westergaard's drawing of the Prophet with a turban resembling a bomb was one of a dozen cartoons lampooning Islam published by the Danish daily Jyllands-Posten, which led to violent protests in 2006 and threats to cartoonists, journalists and the newspaper. Most Muslims consider any depiction of the founder of Islam offensive, and protests resulted in at least 50 deaths. Westergaard's cartoon was the one that attracted the most attention. He has lived for years under police protection following numerous threats against him and the newspaper. On Dec. 29, Danish and Swedish police arrested five men suspected of plotting a "Mumbai-style" attack to kill as many people as possible at the Copenhagen building that houses the newspaper. Three of the men remain in custody in Denmark and one in Sweden, facing charges of planning an act of terrorism. The fifth man was later released.