3 brothers get life sentences in Fort Dix case

CAMDEN, N.J. — Three immigrant brothers involved in a plot to kill military personnel, possibly on Fort Dix, were sentenced Tuesday to spend the rest of their lives in prison.

The government had said the men were familiar with the Army post because their father’s pizza shop delivered there, and it presented the case as one of the most startling examples of homegrown terrorism.

Dritan, Eljvir and Shain Duka professed their innocence in courtroom speeches before U.S. District Judge Robert Kugler handed down their sentences. Two other men were to be sentenced Wednesday.

All five were convicted by a jury in December of conspiracy to kill military personnel but were acquitted on attempted-murder charges. Four of them also were convicted on weapons offenses.

Two of the Duka brothers, Dritan and Shain, were given sentences of life plus 30 years because of one of the weapons counts against them.

Defense lawyers and the men’s relatives said the sentences were expected, but the relatives also said they were unjust.

The men also were ordered to pay a total of $125,000 in restitution to the Army, which beefed up security at Fort Dix after hearing about the investigation into the plot.

In meting out the sentences, the judge agreed with prosecutors that the case was shocking.

“But for the intervention of the FBI, at some point in the future,” he said, “they would have killed people.”

Early in the daylong court proceeding, the judge asked Deputy U.S. Attorney William Fitzpatrick whether it made sense to sentence the conspirators to life in prison with no chance of parole given that people convicted of murder in most states at least have the possibility of parole.

“Yes it is,” Fitzpatrick said. “The fact that they didn’t have an opportunity to carry it out should not be a benefit.”

The men were arrested in May 2007. Prosecutors say they had taken training trips to the Pocono Mountains in Pennsylvania and scouted out Fort Dix and other military sites.

Five service members in uniform sat in the back of the courtroom as the sentences were handed down Tuesday.

During the sentencing hearing, the Duka brothers told the judge they were innocent and were convicted because of their unpopular political views. They blamed the government’s use of two convicted criminals as paid informants in the case, claiming those informants cajoled them into saying they would take up arms against the U.S.

“The innocent are in prison while the true criminals are being rewarded heavily,” lamented Shain Duka, 28.

“Being in prison and knowing you are innocent is a great feeling in the sight of God,” said Eljvir Duka, 25.

Relatives and a neighbor of the men also spoke in the hearing, laying out how the brothers were brought to the United States illegally as boys from the former Yugoslavia as their parents sought a better life.

The brothers were raised for a time in Brooklyn, then moved to Cherry Hill, a comfortable suburb of Philadelphia, a dozen years ago after Dritan Duka, now 30, had gotten into legal trouble.

All three had criminal histories dating to their teenage years. Among them: drug offenses, eluding police and driving with a suspended license.

Michael Huff, a lawyer for Dritan Duka, said that becoming more involved in the Muslim faith turned them around.

The men, all school dropouts, owned a pizza shop together and later a roofing company.

Their father, Ferik Duka, told how they supported the family when he was injured in a car accident and were known for taking pizza to homeless people.

“I wish all the children of human beings,” the elder Duka said, “are like my sons.”