But, said the judge, the material could have aided a terrorist, and such serious offences would always carry a prison sentence.
Last November, Padilla was added to an indictment, originally drawn up in South Florida in 2004, that accuses him of conspiracy to murder people overseas, conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists, and providing such support.
Translation: U.S. citizens could then be classified as 'homegrown terrorists,' and as such, theoretically lose all their rights in the same manner as those designated 'enemy combatants,' all for the crime of questioning or verbally challenging their government.
A Manhattan federal jury in March found the Kuwaiti-born 48-year-old guilty of conspiring to kill Americans, conspiring to provide material support for terrorists and providing such support, after a trial that offered a rare glimpse of bin Laden in the hours following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
In March 2008, the office produced a "terrorism watch list" report about a Muslim conference in Georgia at which several Americans were scheduled to speak, even though it "did not have any evidence the conference or the speakers promoted radical extremism or terrorist activity," and such speech is constitutionally protected, an internal report said.
"There's a sense that because of our history as Muslims, terrorist atrocities and such, people feel like we deserve the abuse," said Mr Alam.
It was carried out by people who, if they hadn't been white and dressed as cowboys, might have been called "terrorists" and treated as such.
Critics call AR-15-style rifles the weapon of choice for terrorists and mass murderers; such guns were targeted by the 1994 federal ban on "assault weapons", which some Democrats tried and failed to renew in 2013.
As Trayvon appeared like a criminal to Zimmerman's "expert" eye, scores of Pakistanis, Afghans, Yemenis, and who knows how many others are seen as terrorists and recorded as such after being killed by American drone operators.
