(Adds comments by Stewart, sentence of co-defendants, details throughout)

By Matthew Verrinder

NEW YORK, Oct 16 (Reuters) - A New York attorney convicted of aiding terrorism by helping an imprisoned Egyptian client smuggle messages to militant followers was sentenced on Monday to 28 months in prison.

Lynne Stewart, 67, was convicted in February 2005 of helping her client, Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman, to contact the Islamic Group, which the U.S. government lists as a terrorist organization.

Prosecutors said messages Stewart passed on for Abdel-Rahman could have incited violence in Egypt. The sheikh was convicted in 1995 of conspiring to attack U.S. targets in a plot prosecutors said included the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.

Stewart, long a defender of the poor and unpopular, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge John Koeltl in Manhattan federal court. She could have been sentenced to more than 15 years in prison on charges of supporting terrorism and prosecutors had sought up to 30 years.

Koeltl, who cited Stewart's long service as a defense attorney as grounds for the relatively short prison sentence, allowed her to remain free pending appeal of her conviction.

"We will claim victory here. We are happy and humbled to be going home today," Stewart told a crowd of 150 supporters and media outside the courthouse.

The civil rights lawyer has defended her actions, saying she was only zealously representing her client.

"I hope the government realizes their error ... I hope the appeal will vindicate me and make me back into the lawyer I was."

Tagged as both heroine and radical leftist, Stewart is the only U.S. lawyer to be indicted on terrorism charges. Civil rights groups say the case stemmed from Bush administration efforts to discourage the defense of accused terrorists.

U.S. Attorney Michael Garcia said in a statement that the government was disappointed with Stewart's sentence and would consider an appeal.

OTHER CONVICTIONS

Stewart was arrested six months after the Sept. 11 attacks and was prosecuted along with Arabic translator Mohamed Yousry and New York postal worker Ahmed Sattar.

Sattar, 47, who faced a life sentence for being convicted of conspiring to kill people outside the United States, was sentenced on Monday to 24 years in prison.

Yousry, convicted of aiding in the smuggling of Abdel-Rahman's messages from prison, was sentenced to 20 months.

Evidence in the case against Stewart included a call the lawyer made to a Reuters correspondent in Egypt in which she read a statement issue by the cleric saying he had withdrawn his support for the Islamic Group's cease-fire in Egypt. That correspondent was subpoenaed in the case.

Since her 2002 indictment, Stewart has spoken at rallies, undergone treatment for breast cancer and become the subject of a documentary called "Who's Afraid of Lynne Stewart?"

Outside the court Stewart joked to reporters that she had prepared for "the worst," meaning incarceration, and had brought two mystery novels, cancer medication and a pair of sweatpants for "going inside."

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