Jury Convicts Jason Eaton in Burlington Shooting of 3 Palestinian Students

The three victims were college students visiting Burlington for the Thanksgiving holiday and staying with family connected to one of them.

After nearly two hours of deliberation on the sixth day of his trial, a Chittenden Superior criminal court jury found Jason Eaton guilty on three counts of attempted second-degree murder in the shooting of three Palestinian students near his apartment nearly three years ago.

Eaton, 51, stood quietly at the defense table when the verdict was announced Monday and showed no visible reaction. He has been held in custody since his arrest a day after the incident and now faces up to life in prison without the possibility of parole on each count. A sentencing date had not been scheduled by Monday evening.

The case centered less on whether Eaton fired the weapon, which his defense did not dispute, and more on his mental condition at the time of the Nov. 25, 2023, attack. His lawyers argued he was legally insane and could not be held criminally responsible. Prosecutors, meanwhile, said the evidence showed a deliberate shooting carried out after alcohol, marijuana, and mounting personal stress pushed him into violence.

The three victims, Hisham Awartani, Kinnan Abdalhamid and Tahseen Aliahmad, were college students visiting Burlington for the Thanksgiving holiday and staying with family connected to one of them. Two were treated at University of Vermont Medical Center and later discharged, while Awartani remains paralyzed.

Outside the courtroom after the verdict, Elizabeth Price, Awartani’s mother, spoke for the families and said the jury had brought accountability after years of pain. She said the decision did not erase the damage caused by the shooting, but it did establish responsibility for Eaton’s actions. She also said the family believes the men were targeted because they were Palestinian, even though no hate-crime charge was filed.

Chittenden County State’s Attorney Sarah George said jurors gave the evidence the attention it deserved and described the verdict as a form of closure for the community and the three men.

During the trial, a firearms expert testified that a Ruger handgun recovered from Eaton’s apartment matched shell casings and a bullet found at the scene. The dispute focused instead on Eaton’s state of mind.

Jurors heard a recording made five days after the shooting in which Eaton described hearing voices through a portable FM radio that he believed were coming from the CIA, the Israeli Mossad, or God. In that same recording, he said he had been watching a home across from his Burlington apartment where a Jewish family lived and believed it was his duty to protect them. He also said those voices later directed him to shoot people on Nov. 25, 2023, after he saw the three men walking nearby and received what he described as a powerful order to stop them.

A defense psychiatric expert told the jury that Eaton was suffering from a psychotic disorder with delusions and was legally insane at the time. The state’s expert offered a different view, saying he was not legally insane and was instead reacting to stress after losing his job and fearing he might lose his apartment and become homeless. That expert also said Eaton met the criteria for narcissistic personality disorder.

At one point during the trial, Eaton tried unsuccessfully to dismiss his lawyers and represent himself. In closing arguments, George urged jurors to reject the insanity claim, while defense attorney Margaret Jansch argued that a lack of a prior psychotic diagnosis did not eliminate the possibility that Eaton was experiencing one during the shooting. She also said he had repeatedly sought help over the years and that his delusional thinking had continued afterward through his own legal filings.

The shooting drew international attention in the weeks after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack against Israel and deeply unsettled Burlington. According to the prosecution, Eaton later followed news coverage from jail and learned the men were in town visiting the grandmother of one of them. George said he placed blame on the grandmother in the recorded discussion with his attorneys.