Abouammo, who worked at Twitter from 2013 to 2015, was arrested in 2019. Ali Alzabarah, another former Twitter employee who was also charged in the scheme, fled the country before he could be arrested. Several of the charges of which Abouammo was acquitted were related to communications between Alzabarah and Saudi officials, suggesting that the jury was not convinced that Abouammo had influenced his co-worker’s actions.

Prosecutors described Abouammo as a mole who had sold his access to personal user information to Saudi Arabia.

“Power. Greed. Lies. You heard this story, told by the evidence, here in this courtroom,” said Eric Cheng, an assistant US attorney, during closing statements. A US Justice Department spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Abouammo repeatedly looked up personal information for the Twitter user behind an account known as Mujtahidd, as well as for other dissidents, prosecutors said. The Mujtahidd account is critical of Saudi leadership and has more than 2 million followers on Twitter. Prosecutors said Saudi representatives had paid $US300,000 to Abouammo for the information.

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Lawyers for Abouammo described him as merely a Twitter employee who had been doing his job. Other media-partnerships managers at Twitter also developed close relationships with influential people who used the platform and provided white-glove service, helping them become verified on Twitter and handling their complaints about impersonators and troublesome accounts, Abouammo’s defence argued.

Prosecutors had not connected Abouammo’s accessing information and receiving payments with actual sharing of that information, his lawyers said.

“Even if you think Mr. Abouammo possibly or probably did it, you must vote not guilty,” said Angela Chuang, a federal public defender who represents Abouammo and a lead attorney in the case, during closing statements. Jerome Matthews, another lawyer for Abouammo, declined to comment on the verdict.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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