How Unstable Is He?

The death penalty trial of Zacarious Moussaoui -- the only man tried here in the US on charges related to the 9/11 attacks -- continued in Alexandria, VA Monday, with testimony from the defense about his wretched upbringing and his overall mental stability.

Jan Vogelsang, a clinical social worker, testified that the 37-year-old Frenchman of Morrocan descent was in and out of orphanages the first six years of his life, and endured taunts of "dirty Arab" by the family of his teenage girlfriend, with whom he lived briefly.

The jury also heard videotaped testimony from Moussaoui's sister Jamilla, who described her younger brother as "a pretty little baby, always smiling... he was the little sweetheart of the family."

Moussaoui's sister also testified their father, Omar, reportedly beat Jamilla and their mother. "Each time [our father] reappeared in our lives, it was to traumatize us," Jamilla said. "He left us completely destitute. He was a man who never should have had children."

The defense presented the evidence Monday in hopes of proving Moussaoui shouldn't be put to death because he's deranged from years of such torment-- a strategy Moussaoui himself called "American B-S" as he was led from the courtroom, according to the San Francisco Times.

Moussaoui has said he and shoe-bomber Richard Reid were to have flown a fifth hijacked plane into the White House on 9/11. In remarks that will be summarized at the federal courthouse in Alexandria, however, Reid -- who's now in prison -- will reportedly say that there was no such plan.

Other al-Qaeda operatives now in custody say even they thought Moussaoui was too deranged to be an active part in the 9/11 plot.

Moussaoui faces the death penalty for not telling investigators about the attacks between the time he was arrested, and the day four commercial planes were hijacked and turned into guided missiles that destroyed the World Trade Center in New York and damaged the Pentagon.

FMI: www.usdoj.gov