Rashid Baz is a Lebanese-born immigrant and convicted murderer who, in the Brooklyn Bridge shooting

Brooklyn Bridge Shooting

The Brooklyn Bridge Shooting occurred on March 1, 1994. In the attack, Lebanese-born immigrant Rashid Baz shot at a van of 15 Chabad-Lubavitch Orthodox Jewish students that was traveling on the Brooklyn Bridge. He used a Cobray semi-automatic pistol to strafe the van, and a Glock 9-millimeter...

, shot and killed 16-year old Ari Halberstam

Ari Halberstam

Ari Halberstam was a yeshiva student from a distinguished family associated with the Chabad-Lubavitch movement, who was killed in a terrorist shooting in New York City....

 on March 1, 1994, while driving on the ramp to the Brooklyn Bridge

Brooklyn Bridge

The Brooklyn Bridge is one of the oldest suspension bridges in the United States. Completed in 1883, it connects the New York City boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn by spanning the East River...

 (re-named the Ari Halberstam ramp in 1995).

The Shooting

While driving on the approach ramp to the Brooklyn Bridge

Brooklyn Bridge

The Brooklyn Bridge is one of the oldest suspension bridges in the United States. Completed in 1883, it connects the New York City boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn by spanning the East River...

 from the FDR Drive Baz took out two 9 mm semi-automatic pistols and fired on a van carrying 15 members of the Lubavitcher sect of Judaism, who were returning from a visit to the hospital where the Lubavitcher Rebbe had undergone minor surgery. Ari Halberstam was shot in the head and died four days later in the hospital; three other students were seriously wounded in the attack.

Trial

Baz's defense team portrayed him as suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder

Post-traumatic stress disorder

Posttraumaticstress disorder is a severe anxiety disorder that can develop after exposure to any event that results in psychological trauma. This event may involve the threat of death to oneself or to someone else, or to one's own or someone else's physical, sexual, or psychological integrity,...

 due to his childhood exposure to violence during the Lebanese Civil War

Lebanese Civil War

The Lebanese Civil War was a multifaceted civil war in Lebanon. The war lasted from 1975 to 1990 and resulted in an estimated 150,000 to 230,000 civilian fatalities. Another one million people were wounded, and today approximately 350,000 people remain displaced. There was also a mass exodus of...

. They argued further that Baz's actions were triggered by the killing of 29 Muslims just four days earlier by Baruch Goldstein

Baruch Goldstein

Baruch Kopel Goldstein was an American-born Jewish Israeli physician and mass murderer who perpetrated the 1994 Cave of the Patriarchs massacre in the city of Hebron, killing 29 Palestinian Muslim worshipers and wounding another 125....

 in Hebron

Hebron

Hebron , is located in the southern West Bank, south of Jerusalem. Nestled in the Judean Mountains, it lies 930 meters above sea level. It is the largest city in the West Bank and home to around 165,000 Palestinians, and over 500 Jewish settlers concentrated in and around the old quarter...

, West Bank

West Bank

The West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...

. The jury rejected this argument, and on December 1, 1994, Baz was convicted on one count of murder, 14 counts of attempted murder, and one count of criminal use of a firearm

Firearm

A firearm is a weapon that launches one, or many, projectile at high velocity through confined burning of a propellant. This subsonic burning process is technically known as deflagration, as opposed to supersonic combustion known as a detonation. In older firearms, the propellant was typically...

.

Sentencing

On January 18, 1995, Baz received a term of 141 years in prison with no chance of parole. Judge Harry Rothwax stated that Baz deserved the "most severe punishment." Baz is currently serving his prison term at the Auburn Correctional Facility, in upstate New York.

Justice Department inquiry

On August 26, 1999 the Justice Department

United States Department of Justice

The United States Department of Justice , is the United States federal executive department responsible for the enforcement of the law and administration of justice, equivalent to the justice or interior ministries of other countries.The Department is led by the Attorney General, who is nominated...

 and FBI agreed to open an investigation into Baz. The investigation did not yield any new leads connected to terrorist organizations but the Justice Department did formally reclassify the incident as an act of terrorism

Terrorism

Terrorism is the systematic use of terror, especially as a means of coercion. In the international community, however, terrorism has no universally agreed, legally binding, criminal law definition...

.http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F20D12F639580C758CDDAB0994D8404482&n=Top%2fReference%2fTimes%20Topics%2fSubjects%2fR%2fReligion%20and%20Belief

External links

• http://www.state.ny.us/governor/press/04/march1_04.htm
• http://www.arihalberstam.com/php/5.php
• http://www.meforum.org/article/77
• http://www.nysun.com/article/28767?access=695821