[JURIST] Spain's National Court [official website, in Spanish] on Wednesday convicted five people for their involvement in the 2004 Madrid train bombings [BBC backgrounder, JURIST news archive] on charges of supporting terrorist groups that planned attacks. The men were indicted [JURIST report] in November, along with two other suspects, and were accused of providing money, housing, food, and forged documentation to the suspected perpetrators of the Madrid bombings. The suspects, Moroccan, Algerian, and Turkish nationals, were sentenced [El Pais report, in Spanish] to jail terms ranging from five to nine years. Among those sentenced was the group's alleged leader, Omar Nakhcha, who received the strictest sentence [AFP report, in Spanish].

In all, 28 co-defendants [BBC profiles] were charged in Spain with 192 counts of murder and upwards of 1,800 counts of attempted murder related to the March 11, 2004 bombings, which killed 191 people and injured almost 2,000 more. Three defendants were convicted of murder [JURIST report] and 18 others were found guilty of lesser charges. Last year, Spain's highest court of appeal said that 25 appeals had been filed [JURIST report] against verdicts handed down against convicted participants for the bombings, both from defendants and from victims. The defendants have all protested their innocence and condemned the attacks.