A former Twitter executive convicted of spying for Saudi Arabia has been sentenced to 3.5 years in the US. prison, prosecutors said on Wednesday. Ahmad Abouammo was found guilty by a jury in August after a trial in federal court in San Francisco. He faced a 10-year prison sentence in one case and 20 years in prison in several other cases.
Abouammo has been accepting bribes from Saudi officials since 2014, prosecutors said. at Twitter, he helped oversee relations with journalists and celebrities in the Middle East and North Africa. He was found guilty of leaking sensitive information from the company’s systems to help Saudi officials identify and locate interesting Twitter users.
Federal public defenders representing Abouammo did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Twitter, recently acquired by Elon Muskalso did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
prosecutors had argued that Bader Al-Asaker, a close adviser to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, recruited Abouammo to use his insider knowledge to access Twitter accounts and dig up personal information on Saudi dissidents.
These accounts allegedly included @mujtahidd, a pseudonym for a political agitator who gained millions of Twitter followers in the Arab Spring uprisings by accusing the Saudi royal family of corruption and other wrongdoings.
Prosecutors said Abouammo received at least $300,000 from Al-Asaker (about his own account in the United States. Defense attorneys had argued that Abouammo’s work at Twitter was simply part of his job.
Abouammo was also convicted of wire fraud and honest services fraud, money laundering and a charge of conspiracy.
Ali Alzabarah, a former colleague of Abouammo who is also accused of accessing Twitter accounts on behalf of Saudi Arabia, left the US before he was charged. Al-Asaker, Saudi Crown Prince and Twitter are not among the accused.
© Thomson Reuters 2022
