Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) alumnus, Vikram Buddhi, has been sentenced to four years nine months in prison in US. Thirty-eight-year-old Buddhi was arrested from Purdue University for posting hate messages on the Internet against former US President George W Bush. Reacting to the judgement, Buddhi said: "This is a grave miscarriage of justice. I'm not the kind of person the US government is portraying me to be." I got the short end of the stick in this case, he added. Buddhi has 10 days to appeal against the verdict.
Earlier on Thursday, there was high drama in the Indiana court where Buddhi was to be sentenced. Buddhi said he wanted to fire his lawyer. The IIT alumnus, who has been in prison since 2006, said his lawyer had not bothered to meet with him or share his strategy with the PhD student. The indictment alleged that Buddhi made threats against the then US president, Vice-President Dick Cheney, and their wives, and called for bombings of US infrastructure. Since Buddhi had already fired his previous lawyer, the judge said he had to either stick with his current counsel or represent himself.
A former Math and Electrical Engineering student, who has been reading law books from a poorly-stocked prison library chose the latter saying "I have no choice but to represent myself." From then on, Buddhi spent 7 hours, valiantly trying to defend himself. At one point, when he struggled and took some time to frame his cross-examination questions, the judge said sarcastically, "Sure, take your time. We'll just sit here all day. How's that?" Buddhi has all along claimed he's innocent. The hope for him right now lies in the fact that he can appeal.
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