Jim Brown, THE CANADIAN PRESS

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OTTAWA - Momin Khawaja can't be found guilty of terrorism just because he happens to know some terrorists, the defence lawyer for the Ottawa software developer said Friday.

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THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick

Crown Prosecutor David McKercher leaves the Ottawa Courthouse following the Momin Khawaja trial in Ottawa on Friday, Aug. 29, 2008.

Lawrence Greenspon called on the judge at Khawaja's trial to reject prosecution efforts to convict his client based on what he calls guilt by association.

"There could not be any greater injustice," Greenspon told Justice Douglas Rutherford, who is hearing the case without a jury.

Khawaja faces seven charges under the Anti-Terrorism Act, including a key allegation that he built a remote-control device, known as the Hi-Fi Digimonster, for a British group planning bomb attacks in and around London.

"The issue is not what was planned," said Greenspon. "The issue is whether Momin Khawaja had knowledge of it."

Greenspon concedes Khawaja had dealings with the group, five of whose members were convicted by a London jury last year. But he says the plotters kept Khawaja in the dark about their intention to mount attacks in the U.K.

The defence contends that Khawaja wanted to travel to Afghanistan to fight against western forces, and thought the Digimonster would be used there in bombs aimed at military targets.

Crown attorney David McKercher has argued that there's strong evidence Khawaja knew enough about the British plot to be convicted - and that even if his real target was Afghanistan his actions would still amount to terrorism.

Aside from the charges tied to the British plot, Khawaja faces a range of accusations of facilitating and financing terrorism, taking terrorist training and making a house his family owned in Pakistan available for terrorist use.

Greenspon is asking Rutherford to quash all the terrorism charges on grounds that the Crown hasn't produced enough evidence to sustain them.

He acknowledged Friday - as he has done before - that there could be enough evidence left to proceed on lesser charges of unlawfully building and possessing explosives.

But that would reduce the trial to a simple Criminal Code prosecution with no terrorist connotations.

In that case, Khawaja could still theoretically be liable to a maximum term of life in prison if he's found guilty of building the Digimonster, and to 14 years on a separate count of possessing it.

In practice, however, there would likely be a "huge difference" in sentencing if Khawaja were convicted of a simple criminal offence, Greenspon said outside the courtroom.

He was careful to note that he's not conceding his client is guilty of the lesser offences. He's only acknowledging there could be enough evidence for the trial to continue on the reduced charges.

Rutherford reserved judgment Friday on the motion to quash and said he'll try to have a ruling ready for Sept. 8, when proceedings are scheduled to resume.