Dutchman the first, and so far only, convicted of criminal charges for Iraq insurgency

WASHINGTON, Feb. 27 (UPI) -- An Iraqi-born naturalized Dutchman is the first man ever convicted by a U.S. criminal court for his part in the Iraq insurgency.

Wesam al-Delaema, 36, pleaded guilty to six charges of conspiring to murder American nationals outside the United States by planting roadside bombs targeting U.S. forces in Fallujah -- and by videotaping himself showing how the bombs would be set off to destroy U.S. vehicles and kill their occupants.

The plea agreement and other court documents said Delaema created instructional and recruitment videos to support the insurgency and urged others in Iraq to participate in the fighting and videotape themselves.

The Justice Department said that Delaema had also agreed to plead guilty next week to one count of aggravated assault in which he is accused of kicking a Washington, D.C., prison guard unconscious in December 2007. The guard was hospitalized with "significant injuries, including a subdural hemorrhage," Justice Department spokesman Dean Boyd said.

"This guy was not a nice customer," he added.

Delaema is expected to serve 25 years for the conspiracy charges and 18 months concurrently for aggravated assault. Sentencing has been set for April 15. The terms of the plea deal mean that Delaema will be returned to the Netherlands, which extradited him in January 2007. There, he will be resentenced by a Dutch judge and serve his sentence in a Dutch prison.

Boyd said that Delaema remains, as far as he knows, the only person to be criminally charged in the United States with actually taking part in the insurgency in Iraq -- although there had been several convictions of people conspiring to train and travel there for that purpose.

In June 2008 and in a separate case in January, a total of five people were convicted of or pleaded guilty to such charges, he said.

Court documents said Delaema, who was born in Fallujah, returned there in October 2003, driving in his Opel Omega.

While Delaema was in Iraq, the documents said he "met with at least six other individuals. Delaema and his associates, each of whom wore a hooded mask over his head, created a video of their meeting," during which "Delaema gave a speech in Arabic" proclaiming him and his associates as "the Mujahedin of Fallujah."

Delaema and his associates also videotaped themselves demonstrating how to bury improvised explosive devices under the road and set them off with remote-controlled detonators. In the video, they discussed separating charges by 50 feet or more, so as to strike more than one vehicle in the target convoy, according to portions of a transcript provided in the court documents.

The video and other recordings were seized at Delaema's apartment in Amersfoort, Netherlands, in May 2005, when he was first arrested.

Dutch media reported at the time that authorities there had been originally been tipped to Delaema by U.S. intelligence. He was extradited to the United States after U.S. prosecutors submitted charges that were not eligible for the death penalty.

Excerpts from his videos and from recordings of his telephone calls, transcribed in court documents, give a chilling glimpse into the shadowy networks that distribute, on the Web and via DVD, video of attacks on U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq.

According to the court documents, after his return, Delaema took part in telephone conversations monitored by Dutch authorities "with various individuals, known and unknown, in Iraq."

In one, Delaema promises to buy a video camera for his interlocutor so it can be used to videotape attacks on U.S. forces.

In another, he urged, "Take the camera … and do live broadcasting for them" when he heard of a plan to go and see wreckage, supposedly of a U.S. aircraft, that insurgents were parading through town.