Man found guilty of attempted murder after stabbing Salman Rushdie on stage

A man has been convicted of attempted murder and assault for stabbing author Sir Salman Rushdie multiple times on a New York lecture stage in 2022.

A jury found Hadi Matar, 27, guilty after a little less than two hours of deliberations following a trial in Chautauqua County Court, New York.

Matar ran onto the stage at the Chautauqua Institution where Sir Salman was about to speak on August 12 2022, and stabbed him more than a dozen times before a live audience.

Another man was injured.

Sir Salman was the key witness during seven days of testimony, describing in graphic detail his life-threatening injuries and long and painful recovery.

The judge set sentencing for April 23.

Matar could receive up to 25 years in prison.

District lawyer Jason Schmidt played a slow-motion video of the attack for the jury on Friday during his closing argument, pointing out the assailant as he emerged from the audience, walked up a staircase to the stage and broke into a run towards Sir Salman.

“I want you to look at the unprovoked nature of this attack,” Mr Schmidt said.

“I want you to look at the targeted nature of the attack. There were a lot of people around that day but there was only one person who was targeted.”

Assistant public defender Andrew Brautigan told the jury that prosecutors have not proved that Matar intended to kill Sir Salman.

The distinction is important for an attempted-murder conviction.

“You will agree something bad happened to Mr Rushdie, but you don’t know what Mr Matar’s conscious objective was,” Mr Brautigan said.

“The testimony you have heard doesn’t establish anything more than a chaotic noisy outburst that occurred that injured Mr Rushdie.”

Matar had with him knives, not a gun or bomb, his lawyers have said previously.

And in response to testimony that the injuries were life-threatening, they have noted that Sir Salman’s heart and lungs were uninjured.

Sir Salman was the key witness during testimony that began last week.

The Booker Prize-winning author told jurors he thought he was dying when a masked stranger ran onto the stage and stabbed and slashed at him until being tackled by bystanders.

Sir Salman showed jurors his now-blinded right eye, usually hidden behind a darkened eyeglass lens.

Mr Schmidt reminded jurors about the testimony of a trauma surgeon, who said Sir Salman’s injuries would have been fatal without quick treatment.

He also slowed down video showing Matar approaching the seated Sir Salman from behind and reaching around him to stab at his torso with a knife.

Sir Salman raises his arms and rises from his seat, walking and stumbling for a few steps with Matar hanging on, swinging and stabbing until they both fall and are surrounded by onlookers who rush in to separate them.

The recordings also picked up the gasps and screams from audience members who had been seated to hear Sir Salman speak with City of Asylum Pittsburgh founder Henry Reese about keeping writers safe.

Mr Reese suffered a gash to his forehead, leading to the assault charge against Matar.

From the witness stand, institution staff and others who were present on the day of the attack pointed to Matar as the assailant.

Stabbed and slashed more than a dozen times in the head, throat, torso, thigh and hand, Sir Salman spent 17 days at a Pennsylvania hospital and more than three weeks at a New York City rehabilitation centre.

He detailed his long and painful recovery in his 2024 memoir, “Knife”.