Coughenour wrote an op-ed in the New York Times , entitled '' " How to Try a Terrorist " '' , commenting on Michael B. Mukasey 's nomination for Attorney General of the United States . Coughenour compared his experience trying Ahmed Ressam with Michael B. Mukasey 's trial of Omar Abdel Rahman for his role in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing . He noted that Mukasey had complained about " the inadequacy of the current approach to terrorism prosecutions . " He noted that Mukasey had complained about the limited number of terrorism convictions . Coughenour paraphrased Mukasey : " Open prosecutions … potentially disclose to our enemies methods and sources of intelligence-gathering . Our Constitution does not adequately protect society from ' people who have cosmic goals that they are intent on achieving by cataclysmic means . ' " Coughenour wrote that his experience : " only strengthened my conviction that American courts , guided by the principles of our Constitution , are fully capable of trying suspected terrorists . " On July 27 , 2005 , Coughenour sentenced Ressam to 22 years in prison , plus 5 years of supervision after his release . On February 2 , 2010 , the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the 22-year sentence Coughenour had handed down was too lenient , and did not fit in the then-mandatory sentencing guidelines which indicated Ressam should have received at least 65 years , and up to 130 years , in prison . The court ordered that Ressam be re-sentenced by a different district court judge than Coughenour . An en banc panel of the Ninth Circuit subsequently reconsidered the 2010 opinion . The en banc panel agreed that the 22-year sentence was too lenient , but refused to remand the case to a different judge , instead sending the case back to Judge Coughenour . On remand , Judge Coughenour sentenced Ressam to 37 years imprisonment to be followed by 5 years of supervised release . The United States did not appeal the sentence
1993 World Trade Center bombing
1993 World Trade Center bombing
John C. Coughenour