Zainab Abdirahman-Khalif pleads for privacy after court overturns historic terror conviction
The first person ever convicted of terrorism offences in SA has thanked her supporters and community after an outpouring of emotion following her successful appeal.
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She has spent 891 days in a prison cell, first accused and then convicted of being a member of the world’s most feared terrorist group.
On Thursday, Zainab Abdirahman-Khalif walked from the Full Court a free woman, acquitted of ties to Islamic State, and into the arms of her family.
Speaking exclusively to The Advertiser, the former nursing student said her focus was on rebuilding her life alongside those who had always supported her.
“I’m very happy with the result and very grateful to be back with my family,” she said after the stunning judgment.
“I want to thank the Somali community, my legal team and family for being there and being supportive through all of this.
“I’d now ask for privacy so I can spend time reconnecting with my family.”
On Thursday, Zainab Abdirahman-Khalif wept and embraced her mother as she was freed from custody, her name and reputation cleansed of a purported membership to the Islamic State terror group.
She had been the first South Australian ever convicted of terrorism offences.
In a majority decision, the Full Court of the Court of Criminal Appeal overturned the jury verdict that found the former nursing student had sworn fealty to the feared organisation.
It ruled there was no evidence presented at her trial that allowed it to “evaluate” her actions “with formal or informal membership of IS”.
Two of the three judges agreed Federal law’s definition of membership was too broad, while the dissenting judge said taking a narrow view was “an oversimplification”.
Chief Justice Chris Kourakis invited Ms Abdirahman-Khalif to leave the dock upon the handing down of the court’s decision.
“There’s no reason she should not be released,” he said.
She was immediately embraced by her mother and surrounded by her supporters, who have long backed her insistence that she was never a member of IS.
Ms Abdirahman-Khalif, 24, of Mansfield Park, pleaded not guilty to one count of being a member of a terrorist organisation between 2016 and 2017.
Prosecutors alleged she had IS propaganda videos, including beheadings, on her phone and sent a text saying it was her “destiny” to be a “Muwahideen” in Adelaide.
They played recordings that allegedly captured Ms Abdirahman-Khalif singing pro-IS songs and swearing an oath of loyalty to the group.
Jurors were told she tried to leave SA for Turkey, without her family’s knowledge and with just hand luggage and $170, to join the organisation.
Abdirahman-Khalif was found guilty, but filed an appeal against her conviction citing allegations of judicial “imbalance”.
She claimed Justice David Peek erred in his directions to jurors and did not address possible “innocent explanations” for her behaviour.
It was not her first complaint against Justice Peek – his opening address to the jury pool was labelled “inaccurate and unduly gruesome” by her counsel.
In their judgment on Thursday, all three judges agreed the assertions against Justice Peek did not amount to legal errors warranting an appeal.
Abdirahman-Khalif’s acquittal was instead secured on legal grounds – specifically the definition of “membership” in Federal law.
Chief Justice Kourakis said that, by law, prosecutors had to prove a terror group maintained “clear criteria, or method of identification” of its members to secure a conviction.
He said that, in Abdirahman-Khalif’s case, they “failed to proffer any such evidence”.
“The meaning of an organisation does not extend to the population or individuals governed by it, even if they are supporters of its aims and objectives,” he said.
“(The law) cannot proclaim, as a terrorist organisation, an entire society or a population which is governed by a particular organisation.
“It prescribes the organisation, in a narrow sense, known as IS and not the residents – even supportive residents – of the territory it controls.”
He said Abdirahman-Khalif’s conviction must be set aside, and no retrial ordered.
“The evidence did not prove that the informal membership of IS included the wives of its fighters or the persons who nursed them,” he said.
“In so far as those wives and nurses were members of a broad class of the population governed by IS and who supports its rule, they were not an organisation as defined.”
Justice Greg Parker agreed, but Justice Trish Kelly dissented from the majority, saying the term “member” should not “be given any technical or legal meaning”.
“There is nothing in the (law) which supports a contention that (Federal) parliament intended to place a ceiling or upper limit on the scale or size of a terrorist organisation,” she said.
“(The law) should be interpreted as specifying the organisation in a manner sufficiently broad so as to capture the entirety of its operation, recruitment, membership and engagement in the doing of, or advocating for doing of, terrorist acts.”
She rejected the assertion that wives or nurses were automatically not members of terror groups, saying that depended on “the specific actions and intentions” of each individual.
“In my view, to assume that wives and nurses could not be members of IS as much as any fighter is to oversimplify the matter,” she said.
“Such an old-fashioned view of the capabilities of women completely ignores … there was clearly a role for women in IS beyond that of marriage, nursing and motherhood.”