Militant jailed over comb attack

Mr Pepe waved a comb and shouted in court

An alleged former aide to Osama Bin Laden said he was "sorry" as he was sentenced to 32 years in jail for stabbing a prison guard in the eye.

Mamdouh Mahmud Salim, 46, sunk his head in his hands as he was yelled at by his victim in the New York courtroom.

"Look at me. It's dead. There's nothing there!" shouted the guard, Louis Pepe, as he pointed at his empty socket.

Mr Pepe was ordered to leave the court after the outburst, prompting a dozen prison guards to follow him in protest.

The attack in 2000 with a sharpened comb left Mr Pepe brain-damaged, partially paralysed and blinded, and confined to a wheelchair.

Pleaded guilty

Struggling with his words, Mr Pepe waved a comb in the air as he shouted: "They hit me so many times. They hit me again. They hit me again, they hit me again."

After he left, Salim told the judge: "I'm sorry. I'm trying to understand his loss." He had pleaded guilty to attempted murder.

Salim - who prosecutors say is the highest-ranking al-Qaeda member to stand trial in the US - was being held on suspicion of involvement in the 1998 bombings of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which killed 224 people.

Salim said he attacked the guard, hoping to get the keys and go on to stab his two court-appointed lawyers, so he would be given new advocates.

'Brutal'

The government maintained he was planning to take hostages in an escape attempt.

The judge called the attack "appalling" and said it was an "unusually cruel, brutal, gratuitous infliction of injury".

Salim still faces trial and a possible life sentence on conspiracy charges in relation to the bombings.

His accomplice in the attack on Mr Pepe - Khalfan Khamis Mohamed - has already been convicted over the bomb attacks.