Trial of Sept. 11 Suspects Begins in Madrid

By Jerome Socolovsky

Published April 21, 2005 at 11:00 PM CDT

A group of 24 alleged al Qaeda members went on trial Friday in Madrid. Three of them are accused of having helped prepare the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States.

The trial is the biggest so far of alleged Islamist militants in Europe. The prosecution has presented 300 binders containing 100,000 pages of evidence. All of the suspects have denied the charges against them.

Jerome Socolovsky

Jerome Socolovsky is the Audio Storytelling Specialist for NPR Training. He has been a reporter and editor for more than two decades, mostly overseas. Socolovsky filed stories for NPR on bullfighting, bullet trains, the Madrid bombings and much more from Spain between 2002 and 2010. He has also been a foreign and international justice correspondent for The Associated Press, religion reporter for the Voice of America and editor-in-chief of Religion News Service. He won the Religion News Association's TV reporting award in 2013 and 2014 and an honorable mention from the Association of International Broadcasters in 2011. Socolovsky speaks five languages in addition to his native Spanish and English. He holds a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Pennsylvania, and graduate degrees from Hebrew University and the Harvard Kennedy School. He's also a sculler and a home DIY nut.

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