A federal jury on April 29, 2026, convicted Afghan national Mohammad Sharifullah of participating in a nine-year conspiracy to provide material support and resources to a designated foreign terrorist organization, ISIS-K. The case, filed as No. 1:25-cr-00143 in the Eastern District of Virginia, proceeded to a weeklong trial before U.S. District Judge Anthony J. Trenga in Alexandria[2]. According to the Justice Department, Sharifullah admitted in an FBI interview on March 2, 2025, after waiving his Miranda rights, that he helped prepare for the Abbey Gate attack by scouting a route near the airport for an attacker. He was subsequently arrested and extradited to the United States after President Donald Trump publicly highlighted the case in a March 4, 2025, address to a joint session of Congress.
At trial, the government introduced evidence that on Aug. 26, 2021, ISIS-K leadership directed Sharifullah to surveil a road to Hamid Karzai International Airport to confirm it was clear of Taliban checkpoints, and that he traveled the assigned route at approximately 2:00 p.m. and reported back that the route was clear. At approximately 5:36 p.m., ISIS-K operative Abdul Rahman al-Logari, whom Sharifullah knew from their time together in an Afghan prison, detonated a body-worn suicide bomb at Abbey Gate, killing 13 U.S. military service members and approximately 160 civilians. Prosecutors also presented evidence of Sharifullah's alleged roles in two other ISIS-K attacks: a June 20, 2016, suicide bombing targeting Nepali security guards at the Canadian embassy in Kabul, for which Sharifullah conducted pre-attack surveillance and transported the bomber toward the site, and the March 22, 2024, attack on Crocus City Hall near Moscow, for which Sharifullah shared weapons instructions with the gunmen on behalf of ISIS-K. Defense counsel Lauren Rosen argued that prosecutors presented no evidence tying Sharifullah to the bombing beyond his own statements to FBI agents, and that he told agents what he thought they wanted to hear, possibly out of fear of mistreatment in Pakistani custody before his transfer to the United States.
The jury deliberated for roughly eight hours over two days. Jurors sent the judge a note stating they had reached a unanimous verdict on the material-support count but had been deadlocked "for some time" on the question of whether Sharifullah's support resulted in deaths at Abbey Gate, and that they would not be able to reach a verdict on that element. Judge Trenga brought the jury in; the foreperson confirmed the deadlock, and Trenga polled each juror, all of whom confirmed they could not agree on the causation finding. The conviction on the material-support conspiracy count marks the first federal conviction arising from the Abbey Gate attack[1][2].
Sharifullah faces up to 20 years in prison; a federal district court judge will determine the sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors. A life-sentence exposure attached to the causation element, and the jury's deadlock on that finding forecloses it absent further proceedings. Judge Trenga set a deadline at the end of May for the prosecution and defense to file motions addressing how he should handle the hung portion of the verdict, and deferred scheduling a sentencing date. The FBI Washington Field Office conducted the investigation. The prosecution team consisted of Assistant U.S. Attorneys John T. Gibbs, Avi Panth, and Reed Sawyers for the Eastern District of Virginia, and Trial Attorney Ryan D. White of the Justice Department's National Security Division.
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