Judge sentences jailhouse rapist to 40 years in prison

U.S. District Court Judge H. Russel Holland said Sabil Mujahid's crimes were "likely as bad as I have ever seen," leaving his victims filled with enduring terror, anguish and shame. "The crimes were violent. They were abusive," Holland said. "It is clear to me the defendant planned his attacks carefully."

Mujahid, 54, who was serving a 10-year sentence for being a felon in possession of a firearm when he sexually assaulted at least four inmates, all of them Alaska Native men, could be more than 100 years old before being freed because there's no parole in the federal system. Adding in the remaining time on his firearms conviction, he could spend another 47 1/2 years in prison.

The large, powerfully built man appeared at ease in the courtroom as he spoke courteously and thanked the judge for his careful attention to the case.

"I will have to pursue this matter on appeal," Mujahid said.

Holland heard from one of Mujahid's victims, a short Alaska Native man who cried and whose hands shook while he read a prepared statement about what had occurred in the Anchorage Correctional Center, also known as the city jail.

"As a man it makes me feel less of one to tell you I was raped by another man," he said.

He described Mujahid as a "monster" and said he was "the worst of predators in my mind."

Mujahid stared impassively at the man as he struggled to get through his statement.

According to prosecutors, Mujahid raped, sodomized and sexually abused four men and tried to sexually assault two others between May 3, 2009, and May 26, 2010, while incarcerated for being a felon in possession of a firearm at the Anchorage Correctional Center.

Prosecutors said Mujahid has a lengthy criminal history. He was first convicted as an adult at age 25 for attempted murder for shooting a pimp three times in Hawaii in 1980. He served more than 12 years of a 20-year sentence but was picked up for parole violations after only 67 days.

For the next 18 years, Mujahid embarked on a crime-filled, cocaine-fueled life in which he was in and out of prison, prosecutors said. When he landed back in jail for being a felon in possession of a firearm for the second time in March 2010, he used a variety of approaches to get close to the men he then raped or otherwise sexually abused, court documents say.

After raping and sodomizing the victims, he told them not to tell anyone, lest he hurt them or their families, court documents say. One of his victims was a 25-year-old man who looked more like a skinny teenager and had never been in jail before, prosecutors said.

Mujahid befriended the man by offering to have him sit at his table during mealtimes and have his meals served instead of having him wait in line. Mujahid gave the younger man a radio and then arranged for him to be his cellmate, where he raped him.

Mujahid managed to get another one of his victims in his cell where he forced the man, who also had never been in jail before, to masturbate him and provide him with oral sex.

"This is a man who has no conscience," Assistant U.S. Attorney Audrey Renschen said. "The only thing that matters to him is that he does what he wants."