Jason Eaton listens to closing arguments during his trial in Chittenden Superior criminal court in Burlington on Monday, Sept. 21, 2026. Eaton faces charges of attempted second-degree murder in the shooting of three Palestinian students. Pool photo by Paul Heintz/Boston Globe Updated 5:17 p.m. BURLINGTON — A jury found Jason Eaton guilty on three counts of attempted second-degree murder in the shooting of three Palestinian students as they walked near his apartment nearly three years ago.  Jurors returned their verdict on the trial’s sixth day in Chittenden Superior criminal court after a little less than two hours of deliberations that began late Monday morning. Attorneys for Eaton had raised an insanity defense, claiming that he was not criminally responsible for his conduct at the time of the shooting on Nov. 25, 2023. Eaton stood between his two attorneys at the defense table as the verdict was read in the courtroom. He did not appear to display any emotions. The three U.S. college students who were shot — Hisham Awartani, Kinnan Abdalhamid and Tahseen Aliahmad — had been in Burlington visiting relatives of one of them over the Thanksgiving holiday.  Two of the men were treated at University of Vermont Medical Center and later released. Awartani remains paralyzed. ‘Finally feel relief’  Outside the courtroom after the verdict Monday, Elizabeth Price, Awartani’s mother, read a statement to reporters on behalf of the victims’ families.  “Justice has been rendered for Hisham, Kinnan and Tahseen,” Price said, “After three years of sorrow, loss and struggle, our families finally feel relief.”  Price said that the verdict cannot undue the harm that was caused by the shooting.  Hisham Awartani, one of three Palestinian students who were shot by Jason Eaton in November 2023, and his mother, Elizabeth Price, react to the jury’s guilty verdict in Chittenden Superior criminal court in Burlington on Monday, Sept. 21, 2026. Pool photo by Paul Heintz/Boston Globe “It affirms something fundamental: Jason Eaton is responsible for what he did,” Price added of the verdict. “Eaton’s defense argued that he should not be held accountable because he was delusional. The jury rejected this argument. We also reject this.”  Price spoke of the difficulty of listening to the “hateful” comments repeated in court during the trial that Eaton made about the three men. Price said even though Eaton was not charged with hate crimes, she believed that he targeted the three men because they were Palestinian.  Two of the three men were wearing keffiyehs, a traditional scarf that is a symbol of Palestinian identity. They were also speaking a mix of English and Arabic as they walked past Eaton’s apartment on North Prospect Street moments before the shooting.  “We are grateful our sons’ suffering commanded attention and support,” Price added. “We grieve so much that Palestinian suffering never does.”  Eaton’s defense lawyers declined to comment following the verdict.  Chittenden County State’s Attorney Sarah George told reporters Monday afternoon that the jury appeared to have given the case the attention it deserved. “They listened to all of the evidence,” George said of the jurors, adding, “I’m incredibly grateful for the closure that they have now provided not just to the entire community but really to Hashim, Tahseen and Kinnan.” The experts  Eaton’s defense lawyers did not deny during the trial that he committed the shootings. A firearms expert testified that a Ruger handgun seized from Eaton’s apartment matched cartridge casings and a bullet collected at the shooting scene. Instead, the case hinged on Eaton’s mental state at the time. Eaton claimed in a recording taken from five days after the shooting and played for jurors that he was receiving voice messages from government intelligence agencies or maybe even God leading up to the shootings.  A psychiatric expert for the defense testified that Eaton was legally insane at the time, suffering from a psychotic disorder with delusions.  The prosecution’s expert said on the witness stand that Eaton was not legally insane, instead acting out after smoking marijuana and drinking alcohol as he battled stress from a recent job loss that created a risk of him losing his apartment and becoming homeless. That expert said Eaton met the criteria for a narcissistic personality disorder. Eaton, midway through the trial, unsuccessfully tried to fire his attorneys, contending he could do a better job of defending himself. Closing arguments  “Mr. Eaton wants you to believe that, despite all the evidence to the contrary, he has a psychotic disorder,” George, the prosecutor, told jurors during her closing arguments Monday morning. “He wants you to believe that none of the countless mental health professionals that he’s interacted with over the last 30 years got it right, that instead, every one of them got it wrong,” George added.  Margaret Jansch, an attorney for Eaton, said in her remarks to the jury that simply because he had never been diagnosed with a psychotic condition in the past didn’t rule out him having one on the night of the shooting. “I’m not trying to suggest that Mr. Eaton’s a victim here,” Jansch said. “He did know something was wrong with him, and he tried repeatedly to get help with varying degrees of success.”  Also, Jansch said, Eaton’s delusional thinking has continued, as he filed on his own many motions unsuccessfully seeking to raise a public authority defense, contending that his actions were justified because he was acting at the direction of the government.  Margaret Jansch, an attorney for Jason Eaton, speaks during closing arguments in the case against her client in Chittenden Superior criminal court in Burlington on Monday, Sept. 21, 2026. Eaton faces charges of attempted second-degree murder in the shooting of three Palestinian students. Pool photo by Paul Heintz/Boston Globe A key piece of evidence during the trial was a recording of Eaton talking with his legal team five days after the shooting.  Eaton told his attorneys in that recording that in the days leading up to the shooting, he had been hearing voices through his portable FM radio from the CIA, the Israeli Mossad, or possibly God. Eaton added in the recording that he had been keeping watch from his apartment in Burlington on a residence across the street where a Jewish family lived.  He referred to that residence in the recording as a Kibbutz, which is a communal community in Israel, and he viewed it as his job to protect the family. Ultimately, Eaton said in the recording, the voices he was hearing began to direct him and on Nov. 25, 2023, told him to shoot people. That’s when Eaton reported to his attorneys seeing three men walking on the street near the house he was watching. Then, Eaton said in the recording, he got the very “strong” message, “Go stop them now.” Eaton was arrested and charged a day after the incident. In her closing arguments, George called Eaton’s actions in carrying out the shooting intentional.  Chittenden County State’s Attorney Sarah George speaks during closing arguments in Chittenden Superior criminal court in Burlington on Monday, Sept. 21, 2026. Jason Eaton faces charges of attempted second-degree murder in the shooting of three Palestinian students. Pool photo by Paul Heintz/Boston Globe The shooting shocked Burlington and made international headlines, taking place only weeks after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack against Israel. The prosecutor told jurors Monday that after Eaton had been arrested and held in custody, he was following the extensive media coverage of the shooting and learned that the men had been in Burlington visiting the grandmother of one of them. Eaton, in the recorded conversation, George said, blamed that grandmother, claiming that she should have alerted people in the neighborhood that the three young men would be in the area. “I really wish that grandma had been like, “Hey, my grandkids are going to be in the neighborhood — they’re going to dress up like terrorists. Don’t worry, you know,’” George said Eaton told his attorneys in a transcript of the audio recording raised during the trial. “Or see if grandma had said to them, you know, ‘Maybe now’s not a great time to wear that thing on your head,’” George told jurors Eaton said, adding he then told his attorneys, “You know, things are a little tense when you’ve got American hostages over in Palestine, and we’re trying to get them back.” A sentencing date was not immediately set. Eaton, 51, who has been in custody since his arrest a day after the shooting, faces up to life in prison without the possibility of parole on each attempted murder count. Read the story on VTDigger here: ‘Justice has been rendered’: Jury finds Burlington man guilty in shooting of 3 Palestinian students. ...read more read less