Hiiraan Online

The sentencing hearing in San Diego federal court comes four days after the men lost their bid for a new trial, which was requested after it came to light that the investigation was kick-started by the U.S. National Security Agency’s sweeping electronic surveillance program.

U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Miller handed down sentences that were lower than the maximum term and what prosecutors recommended, as he took into account the overwhelming community support for the men and their otherwise upstanding backgrounds.

Still, the judge wanted the sentences to send a strong message against any support of terrorism, saying “seeds of this kind of thinking cannot be sowed here in the United States.”

Basaaly Moalin, a San Diego cabdriver whose actions were considered the most egregious, received the highest term of 18 years.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office said Moalin, 36, led the local effort to raise $10,900 in support of al-Shabab, a violent terrorist group fighting for control of Somalia’s transitional government.

Mohamed Mohamed Mohamud, a 41-year-old City Heights imam who used his influence to solicit funds from others, was sentenced to 13 years.

Issa Doreh, 56, who worked at a money transfer business the men used, received 10 years.

A fourth defendant, Orange County cabdriver Ahmed Nasir Taalil Mohamud, is set to be sentenced in January.

They have already served three years and will be required to serve at least 80 percent of the full terms.

“These men willfully sent money to a terrorist organization, knowing al-Shabaab’s extremely violent methods, and knowing the U.S. had designated it as a foreign terrorist organization,” U.S. Attorney Laura Duffy said in a statement. “Months of intercepted phone conversations included discussion of suicide bombing, assassinations and Jihad. We are satisfied that because of this investigation and prosecution, we have furthered our mission to safeguard national security by blocking financial support to this dangerous group.”

Volumes of letters and signatures poured in for the men from community members, tribal leaders, government officials and family — both in San Diego and Africa. Moalin alone garnered more than 600 letters or signatures.

A similar tone permeated the pleas for mercy, with stories of men who are dedicated to raising money for education and orphans back home, and to the spiritual and financial support of refugees trying to assimilate in San Diego — home to the second largest Somali population in the U.S., behind Minneapolis.

Moalin sponsored numerous students, Mohamud helped open a school and Doreh volunteered at the same federal jail where he is now being held, their attorneys said.

The defense attorneys also urged the judge to put the men’s criminal acts into the context of the turbulent, ever-changing geopolitical situation of their homeland, where “today’s warlord is tomorrow’s national consensus president,” wrote Joshua Dratel, Moalin’s lawyer.

In traveling to Mogadishu to take depositions, co-counsel Alice Fontier told the judge, “That country is out of the realm of understanding for the average American. ... People don’t live in Somalia, they try to survive.”