A military court has sentenced Major Nidal Hasan to death for the 2009 shooting rampage at Fort Hood in which he murdered unarmed fellow soldiers

The same jurors who convicted Hasan had two options: either agree unanimously that Hasan should die or watch the 42-year-old get an automatic sentence of life in prison with no chance of parole. Hasan could become the first American soldier executed in more than half a century. But because the military justice system requires a lengthy appeals process, years or even decades could pass before he is put to death. The American-born Muslim, who has claimed that he acted to protect Islamic terrorists abroad from American "aggression", never denied being the gunman. "He is a criminal. He is a cold-blooded murderer," prosecutor Colonel Mike Mulligan said in his final plea for a death sentence. "This is not his gift to God. This is his debt to society. This is the cost of his murderous rampage."