NEW YORK, March 31 (UPI) -- A Russian man convicted of conspiring to sell weapons he believed would be used to kill Americans should receive a life prison sentence, U.S. prosecutors said.
Viktor Bout, a former Soviet military officer convicted in November in an arms-trafficking and terrorism conspiracy, is to be sentenced Thursday by U.S. District Judge Shira A. Scheindlin, The New York Times reported.
Prosecutors said Bout, 45, conspired to sell millions of dollars worth of weapons, including 700 to 800 surface-to-air missiles, to men he believed were terrorists who planned to kill Americans.
Authorities took Bout into custody in Thailand in March 2008 after he got caught in a Drug Enforcement Administration operation that used informants posing as representatives of the Colombia terrorist group the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC.
"Indeed, Bout was eager to be all things for the FARC -- a one-stop arms supplier, transporter, military instructor and money launderer -- roles from which he expected to reap rich cash dividends," prosecutors Anjan Sahni and Brendan R. McGuire wrote.
Bout, the prosecutors said, had been prepared to deliver the weapons including machine guns, sniper rifles and five tons of plastic explosives with the "specific understanding that they would be used by the FARC to kill Americans stationed in Colombia."
Prosecutors also asked that Bout be ordered to forfeit $20 million.
Albert Y. Dayan, Bout's lawyer, said in a filing his client was innocent. He called the prosecution "the product of malice" by the U.S. government and asked the judge to dismiss the indictment.
