“Federally, you’re looking at more of conspiracies,” the lawyer said.
Matar, he said, “plans on proceeding with a vigorous defense and maintain his innocence.”
Matar, 26, has been held without bail since the attack, during which he stabbed Rushdie more than a dozen times before a stunned audience of about 1,500 people. Knife wounds blinded Rushdie in one eye. The event moderator, Henry Reese, was also wounded before bystanders subdued the assailant.
“This defendant put time and effort into traveling to the western district of New York with the intent of taking the life of another,” US Attorney Trini Ross said. “Only because of the brave efforts of those who were present that day, the defendant was prevented from completing his murderous intention.”
Rushdie detailed the attack and his long and painful recovery in a memoir published in April.
The federal charges come after Matar earlier this month rejected an offer by state prosecutors to recommend a shorter prison sentence if he agreed to plead guilty to both state and the anticipated federal charges. Instead, both cases will now proceed to trial separately. Jury selection in the state case is set for Oct. 15.
A detention hearing in the federal case is scheduled for Aug. 7.
The author spent years in hiding after the Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran issued a fatwa in 1989 calling for Rushdie’s death over his novel “The Satanic Verses.” Khomeini considered the book blasphemous. Rushdie reemerged into the public in the late 1990s.
Matar was born in the US but holds dual citizenship in Lebanon, where his parents were born. He lived in Fairview, New Jersey, prior to the attack. His mother has said that her son became withdrawn and moody after he visited his father in Lebanon in 2018.
The attack raised questions about whether Rushdie had gotten proper security protection, given that he is still the subject of death threats. A state police trooper and county sheriff’s deputy had been assigned to the lecture. In 1991, a Japanese translator of “The Satanic Verses” was stabbed to death. An Italian translator survived a knife attack the same year. In 1993, the book’s Norwegian publisher was shot three times but survived.
The investigation into Rushdie’s stabbing focused partly on whether Matar had been acting alone or in concert with militant or religious groups.
