Ghulam Nabi Fai is an American citizen of Kashmiri descent who was arrested by the FBI and pled guilty to charges of conspiracy in 2011 for secretly taking $3.5 million in ISI funding to lobby the US government on Kashmir. On Friday, Geo reported that Ghulam Nabi Fai ‘has been acquitted by a US court‘. This is incorrect: Fai was not acquitted by any court, only he was released a few months early after US government attorneys petitioned the court. The US judge agreed to release Fai early noting that “the defendant has rendered substantial assistance to the [US] government“.
“Upon consideration of the government’s motion for reduction of sentence and the court, after reviewing the record and hearing the arguments of counsel and having found that the defendant has rendered substantial assistance to the government, it is accordingly ordered that the government’s motion for reduction of sentence is granted,” District Judge Liarn O’Gra said in an order issued on Friday.
Express Tribune also reported Fai’s release and did not incorrectly report that he was ‘acquitted’. However, Express Tribune left out the important detail that Fai earned his early release by giving the US government ‘substantial assistance’.
What information Ghulam Nabi Fai gave to the US government in order to earn his early release from prison is not known.
