A jailed former college student accused of aiding members of al-Qaeda has pleaded guilty on the eve of his trial. Syed Fahad Hashmi has been held in twenty-three-hour solitary confinement for nearly three years. The government’s case rested on the testimony and actions of an old acquaintance of Hashmi’s who turned government informant after his own arrest. Hashmi was being prosecuted for a two-week period when the informant stayed at his home carrying rain gear that was allegedly later delivered to al-Qaeda members in Pakistan. Hashmi was facing the prospect of a seventy-year prison sentence were he to proceed with a trial. He’ll be sentenced in June and now faces up to fifteen years in prison.