NEW YORK – The man who set off smoke bombs on a crowded New York subway train before shooting 10 people in April 2022 was sentenced on Thursday to life in prison over one of the most violent attacks ever seen on the city’s transit system.

Frank James, 64, was sentenced to 10 life terms plus 10 years by US District Court Judge William Kuntz during a hearing in Brooklyn federal court.

James pleaded guilty in January to 10 counts of terrorism and weapons charges.

“Today, Frank James was sentenced for his deliberate and calculated act of terror against our city,” Mr James Smith, who heads the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) New York field office, said in a statement.

“He aimed to kill innocent people who were simply going about their daily lives amid the morning rush.”

The attack followed a string of violent crimes in America’s largest metropolitan transit system, including instances of commuters being pushed onto subway tracks.

James, who was apprehended in Manhattan’s East Village neighbourhood 30 hours after the attack on a Manhattan-bound N train, confessed to the crimes before a judge in January.

He opened fire during the morning rush hour as the train headed to an underground station in Brooklyn’s Sunset Park neighbourhood. James shot 10 people and another 13 were injured in the ensuing panic, according to the police. No one was killed.

His attorneys had sought an 18-year sentence, according to court documents.

James, a native of the city’s Bronx borough with recent addresses in Philadelphia and Milwaukee, had nine prior arrests in New York and three in New Jersey, according to the New York Police Department. REUTERS