Amanda Lindhout kidnapper sentenced to 15 years in prison

By Jim Bronskill, The Canadian Press

A Somalian man found guilty in the kidnapping of Amanda Lindhout has been sentenced to 15 years in prison.

Ontario Superior Court Justice Robert Smith handed down the sentence for Ali Omar Ader on Monday.

Smith ruled in December that Ader, a 40-year-old Somalian national, was a “willing participant” in the 2008 hostage-taking of Lindhout, who was working as a freelance journalist near Mogadishu at the time.

The judge found much of Ader’s testimony unbelievable and did not support his claim that he was forced into serving as a negotiator and translator on behalf of a gang which threatened to harm him and his family.

Lindhout, raised in Red Deer, Alta., and photographer Nigel Brennan of Australia were snatched by armed men while pursuing a story, the beginning of 15 months in captivity.

The RCMP lured Ader to Canada on the pretext of signing a lucrative book-publishing deal, leading to his arrest in Ottawa in June 2015.

Ader acknowledged to undercover officers that he had received $10,000 for his role in the kidnapping.

Samir Adam, one of Ader’s lawyers, said at a March sentencing hearing that 10 to 12 years in prison would be appropriate. The Crown was seeking a term of 15 to 18 years.

In sentencing Ader to 15 years, Smith said he would receive six years’ credit for time already spent in custody.

As negotiator for the gang, Ader held many long-distance telephone conversations with Lindhout’s mother, Lorinda Stewart, who told him the family was selling possessions and scrambling to raise ransom money.

At one point Lindhout was driven at night into the desert, where a knife was held to her throat. While Ader was not present, he helped the gang connect a phone call to Stewart so she could hear her daughter’s hysterical screams.

Delivering a prepared statement at the sentencing hearing, Lindhout said the confinement in squalid conditions left her with severe post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, the inability to sustain friendships, insomnia, nightmares, digestive problems and broken teeth.

“For years after my release I couldn’t really believe I was free.”

Brennan also read a victim impact statement, saying he, too, has suffered from post-traumatic stress, panic attacks and nightmares. Being forced to hear Lindhout’s screams from torture in an adjoining room is “a memory that will mentally stay with me for the rest of my life,” he said.

Ader expressed remorse at the March hearing, saying he was human and therefore flawed.

“I am sorry, I apologize and ask you for forgiveness,” he said, requesting freedom so he could care for his family in Somalia.

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