New York: The man convicted of stabbing Salman Rushdie on a New York lecture stage three years ago was on Friday sentenced to 25 years in prison.
A jury found 27-year-old Hadi Matar guilty of attempted murder and assault, reported AP.
The daring assault in public, on 12th August 2022, left the prize-winning author blind in one eye.
Rushdie, who was issued a fatwa calling for his death for his controversial novel ‘Midnight’s Children’, was not in the New York courtroom for his assailant’s sentencing, but submitted a victim impact statement.
During the trial, the 77-year-old author was the key witness, describing how he believed he was dying when a masked attacker plunged a knife into his head and body more than a dozen times as he was being introduced at the Chautauqua Institution to speak about writer safety.
Before his sentence was read out, Matar made a statement about freedom of speech in which he called Rushdie a hypocrite.
“Salman Rushdie wants to disrespect other people. He wants to be a bully, he wants to bully other people. I don’t agree with that,” said Matar, clad in white-striped jail clothing and in handcuffs.
Matar received the maximum 25-year prison sentence for the attempted murder of Rushdie and seven years for wounding a man who was on stage with him. The sentences will run concurrently because both victims were injured at the same event, Chautauqua County District Attorney Jason Schmidt said.
Following the near-fatal attack, Rushdie spent 17 days at a Pennsylvania hospital and over three weeks at a New York City rehabilitation centre.
Rushdie, who has also authored books like ‘The Moor’s Last Sigh’ and ‘Victory City’, wrote in detail about his recovery in his 2024 memoir, titled ‘Knife.’
Matar will next face a federal trial on terrorism-related charges. While the first trial focused mainly on details of the knife attack, the next one is expected to delve into the more complicated issue of motive.
