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Moussaoui trial jury hears last moments of doomed Flight 93

The cockpit voice recorder depicting a revolt by passengers on Flight 93, which hijackers sought to fly into the US Capitol in Washington on Sept. 11, 2001, was played to the jury in the death sentencing trial of Zacarias Moussaoui on Wednesday.

"Ladies and gentleman, here is the captain," says one of the hijackers at the beginning of the tape.

"Please sit down ... we have a bomb on board. So sit," the tape continues.

"Please don't hurt me ... I don't want to die. I don't want to die," somebody else says, possibly a passenger or a flight attendant.

"Don't move. Shut up ... down down down. Sit down," says one of the hijackers on the tape.

"In the cockpit! If we don't we'll die," is heard as passengers apparently try to storm the cockpit.

"Allah is the greatest. Allah is the greatest," is the last voice heard before the tape goes silent.

It is the first time the 31-minute recording has been heard in public.

Flight 93 crashed in Pennsylvania when the passengers revolted after hearing by phone from relatives that two planes had hit the World Trade Center towers in New York. 44 people, including the four hijackers, died.

In yet another morning of emotional testimony, the jury also heard the voices of other passengers on the Flight 93 plane calling relatives, and from the husband of a flight attendant on the plane.

Prosecutors seeking the death penalty for Moussaoui rested their case in the early afternoon.

Defense lawyers were due to begin their case yesterday and will seek to paint their client as mentally ill, with delusions of having had a role in the Sept. 11 attacks.

Moussaoui's attorneys on Monday subpoenaed the British shoe-bomber Richard Reid, in an effort to discredit Moussaoui's claim that he and Reid were to fly a fifth plane into the White House on Sept. 11.

Moussaoui pleaded guilty last April to six charges of conspiracy and earlier this month was deemed eligible for execution by the jury of 12 in Alexandria, Virginia.

Prosecutors say the attacks could have been prevented if Moussaoui had revealed the plot upon his arrest three weeks before Sept. 11, 2001.

Jurors must now decide whether Moussaoui should be sentenced to death or life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Hamilton Peterson, whose father and stepmother died on the flight, told reporters he could hear a passenger attacking and killing one of the hijackers as they stormed the cockpit.

"This is an example of ordinary citizens stepping up to the plate to protect the US Capitol from an attack," Peterson said outside the Eastern District Courthouse in Alexandria.

Though the transcripts of the voice recorder were released to the general public, the audio tape itself will not be made available after relatives of victims voiced objections.
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