A man has been convicted of attempted murder for shooting three Palestinian university students in the US state of Vermont nearly three years ago, with the jury rejecting his insanity claims.
Lawyers for Jason Eaton, 51, said he believed he heard instructions from the CIA and Mossad over the radio to shoot someone before he attacked Hisham Awartani, Tahseen Aliahmad and Kinnan Abdalhamid near the University of Vermont.
Eaton never denied being the shooter but pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. He now awaits sentencing, where he could be given life in prison.
The November 2023 attack left Awartani paralysed from the waist down, and wounded the two others.
The week-long trial included testimony from the three students, who are now all aged 23, and from psychiatrists called by both the defence and prosecution.
According to the Associated Press, Eaton stared blankly as the jury read the guilty verdict, while Awartani – who attended the trial in a wheelchair – and Aliahmad smiled and hugged those around them.
His defence team had argued Eaton’s mental health had spiralled, pushing him into a bout of psychosis, after he lost his job at a credit union weeks before the incident.
Eaton’s lawyers said he believed the CIA was talking to him through a local radio broadcast and directed him to “go out and shoot somebody”.
“He believed he’d been instructed to do this by a government agency or God,” defence attorney Joshua O’Hara said.
The shooting occurred the month after the start of the ongoing Israel-Gaza war and amid a rise in Islamophobia and antisemitism in the US.
It reportedly took place as the three men were walking near Eaton’s home, speaking a mix of Arabic and English and wearing traditional Palestinian scarves known as keffiyehs.
Abdalhamid was a Haverford College student. Awartani attended Brown University in Rhode Island, and Ahmed was a student at Trinity College in Connecticut.
The three had previously attended school in Ramallah together and were visiting Awartani’s grandmother for Thanksgiving.
