Moussaoui Judge: It's Clear Who Won

U.S. Judge Leonie Brinkema sent Zacarias Moussaoui to prison for life Thursday, to "die with a whimper," for his role in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. He declared: "God save Osama bin Laden, you will never get him."

Brinkema and the unrepentant Moussaoui capped the two-month trial with an intense exchange that will mark the defendant's last public words before his incarceration.

The prison likely to be Moussaoui's new home is one of the highest maximum-security lockups in the country.

The Administrative Maximum in Florence, Colorado, claims it holds the "most violent, disruptive and escape prone inmates" in the prisons system.

Officials note the $60 million, 490-bed facility hasn't had a single escape or serious attempt since it was built in 1994. The jail already holds about 400 of the highest-risk prisoners.

The prison's more infamous inmates include: Theodore Kaczynski (the "Unabomber"), Richard Reid (the "Shoe Bomber"), Eric Rudolph, who bombed abortion clinics and exploded a bomb in Atlanta during the 1996 Olympics, Omar Abdel-Rahman, involved in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and Terry Nichols, convicted for his involvement in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.

Cells range from a little more than 76 square feet to a little more than 86 square feet. Each offers a bed, shower, sink, toilet, metal mirror and television or radio.

Jail windows face interior courtyards and offer no view of the outside world.

A day earlier, a jury rejected the government's case to have Moussaoui executed, deciding instead to send him to prison for life without a chance of parole. Not all jurors were convinced that Moussaoui, who was in jail on immigration charges Sept. 11, had a significant part in the attacks, despite his boastful claims that he did.

Brinkema firmly refused to be interrupted by the 37-year-old defendant as she disputed his claim that his life sentence meant America had lost and he had won.

"Mr. Moussaoui, when this proceeding is over, everyone else in this room will leave to see the sun ... hear the birds ... and they can associate with whomever they want," she said.

She went on: "You will spend the rest of your life in a supermax prison. It's absolutely clear who won."

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Legal Analysis: Jury Hits The Mark
Court Document: Read The Verdict

CBS News Special Report On The Verdict

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"Mr. Moussaoui, you came here to be a martyr in a great big bang of glory," she said, "but to paraphrase the poet T.S. Eliot, instead you will die with a whimper."

At that point, Moussaoui tried again to interrupt her, but she raised her voice and spoke over him.

"You will never get a chance to speak again and that's an appropriate ending."

Brinkema sentenced Moussaoui to six life terms without the chance of parole.

She informed him of his right to appeal the sentence and said she would ask his court-appointed lawyers to file the required notice as a precaution before relieving them from the case. "I believe it would be an act of futility," she said of an appeal, "but you do have a right."

Lisa Dolan, who lost her husband Bob in the attack on the Pentagon, was one of three family members of victims allowed to speak at the brief sentencing hearing.

She turned to Moussaoui said, "There is still one final judgment day."

Moussaoui sat in his chair staring at Dolan and the other family witnesses, Rosemary Dillard and Abraham Scott, betraying no emotion as they spoke.

Moussaoui walked into the courtroom flashing a victory sign.

"You have branded me as a terrorist or a criminal or whatever," Moussaoui said. "Look at yourselves. I fight for my belief." He spoke for less than five minutes.

French authorities said Thursday they may eventually press the U.S. to have Moussaoui serve his life sentence in France, though CBS News' Laura Haim reports that a spokesman for the French Embassy says this is unlikely to happen.

Moussaoui's mother Aicha El Wafi, pressed for her country to intervene, CBS News correspondent Elaine Cobbe reports. "Now he is going to die in little doses," she said. "He is going to live like a rat in a hole. What for? They are so cruel."

After seven days of deliberation, the nine men and three women rebuffed the government's appeal for death for the only person charged in this country in the suicide hijackings of four commercial jetliners that killed nearly 3,000 people on Sept. 11, 2001.

From the White House, President Bush said Wednesday the verdict "represents the end of this case but not an end to the fight against terror." He said Moussaoui got a fair trial and the jury spared his life, "which is something that he evidently wasn't willing to do for innocent American citizens."

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, attending a European Union security conference in Vienna, told reporters Thursday: "There are challenges that exist with respect to prosecuting terrorist cases in our system. I think justice was served in this case."

Under federal law, a defendant automatically receives life in prison when a jury is split, CBS News correspondent Jim Stewart reports. The 42-page verdict form gives no indication on how, or if, the jury split.

The jury rejected two key defense arguments, that Moussaoui suffers a mental illness and that executing him would make him a martyr. No jurors indicated on the verdict form that they gave any weight to those arguments.

Nine jurors found that Moussaoui suffered a difficult childhood in a dysfunctional family where he spent many of his early years in and out of orphanages. Three found that Moussaoui only played a minor role in the attacks.

In their successful defense of Moussaoui, defense lawyers overcame the impact of two dramatic appearances by Moussaoui himself, first to renounce his four years of denying any involvement in the attacks and then to gloat over the pain of those who lost loved ones.

He was still belittling that pain Thursday. Referring to Dillard, who lost her husband Eddie in the Pentagon attack, he said: "I destroyed a life and she lost a husband. Maybe one day she can think about how many people the CIA has destroyed."

"You have a hypocrisy beyond belief," he said. "Your humanity is a selective humanity."

Using evidence gathered in the largest investigation in U.S. history, prosecutors achieved a preliminary victory last month when the jury ruled Moussaoui's lies to federal agents a month before the attacks made him eligible for the death penalty because they kept agents from discovering some of the hijackers.

But even with heart-rending testimony from nearly four dozen victims and their relatives, the jury was not convinced that Moussaoui deserved to die.

Alice Hoagland told CBS News' The Early Show she believes the jury made the right decision. Her son, Mark Bingham, was killed when United Flight 93 crashed in Pennsylvania.

"We all are members of the human race. And as vile and criminal as Mr. Moussaoui has shown himself to be, we in America are above the kind of hatred and violence that he has shown us. So I do welcome the sentence that they've handed down," Hoagland said.

But retired Colonel Brian Birdwell, who survived the attack on the Pentagon, told The Early Show, "Has justice been served? Yes. But not with the voracity that I think that Mr. Moussaoui deserves."