Jurors deadlocked on whether airport deaths resulted from conspiracy
Mohammad Sharifullah, 28, was sentenced Wednesday to 20 years in federal prison for providing material support to the Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP), the affiliate that took credit for the 26 August 2021 suicide bombing at Kabul’s airport during the US military’s evacuation operation. The bombing, which occurred near an entry point known as Abbey Gate, killed 13 US service members and about 160 Afghans.
A federal jury in Virginia convicted Sharifullah in April on one count of providing material support to ISKP. Jurors deadlocked on whether he bore some responsibility for the airport bombing. The jury could not unanimously decide whether any deaths at the airport “resulted from” the conspiracy, sparing Sharifullah a possible life sentence.
US District Judge Anthony Trenga imposed the maximum sentence in a case that Donald Trump had heralded last year during a speech to a joint session of Congress. The judge called Sharifullah a “dedicated terrorist” who expressed no remorse for the “unfathomable” grief and suffering that he had caused. Sharifullah did not testify at his trial and declined to address the court before sentencing.
The hearing included victim impact statements from parents of the slain service members. Mark Schmitz of Missouri addressed Sharifullah directly from a podium only a few feet away, speaking about his 20-year-old son, Marine Corps Lance Cpl Jared Schmitz. “They may have taken his life, but they’ll never take his legacy,” Mark Schmitz said. “A bomb killed my son. It did not kill what he stood for.”
Paula Knauss-Selph, whose son Army Staff Sgt Ryan Knauss was killed in the bombing, told the court the family was “forever changed” by the attack. “No justice will ever be enough to mend my broken heart,” she said.
Prosecutors had sought the 20-year term; Sharifullah’s attorneys requested 17 years. Defense lawyers argued Sharifullah was never an ISKP leader and had not been convicted of any conduct related to the suicide bombing. “He was brought here because the government believed he participated in the Abbey Gate attack, a theory which it was unable to prove at trial,” defense attorneys wrote.
In their sentencing memo, prosecutors described Sharifullah as driven by hatred of Americans, writing that “from his teenage years, when he pledged an oath of allegiance to [ISKP], Sharifullah’s carnage was driven by hate. Hate towards Americans.” They said his role in the attack was scouting a route to Hamid Karzai International Airport. Prosecutors also said Sharifullah told a journalist he wanted to “catch and kill the crusaders” from the United States for invading Afghanistan after the September 11, 2001 attacks.
Prosecutors linked Sharifullah to dozens of other attacks, including a March 2024 assault on a Moscow concert hall that killed roughly 140 people.
A review by US Central Command found that the Abbey Gate bomber was Abdul Rahman al-Logari, an IS member who had been released from an Afghan prison by the Taliban. According to an FBI affidavit, Sharifullah recognized the alleged bomber as an operative he had known while incarcerated.
Defense lawyers argued that prosecutors relied primarily on Sharifullah’s own statements during FBI questioning, which they said were unreliable. His team said Sharifullah told FBI agents what he thought they wanted to hear, possibly because he was afraid of being tortured in Pakistani custody before being brought to the United States.