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SAN FRANCISCO (CBS 5 / AP / BCN) ― The lawyer and parents of John Walker Lindh, the American-born Taliban soldier serving 20 years in prison after his capture in Afghanistan, called on President Bush on Wednesday to commute his sentence and set him free.

"This is a simple cry for justice with regard to one person," attorney James Brosnahan said at news conference in San Francisco.

The renewed call to shorten the sentence of the Bay Area man was based on the relatively light term Australian David Hicks received Saturday after pleading guilty to supporting terrorism. Hicks, who had been imprisoned for five years at Guantanamo Bay and acknowledged aiding al-Qaida during the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan, was given a nine month sentence.

"In the atmosphere of the time, the best John could get was a plea bargain and a 20-year sentence," said Lindh's father, Frank Lindh of San Leandro. "We love our son very much, he was wrongly accused when he was found in Afghanistan."

"Remember John did not plead guilty to any terrorism offense," Frank Lindh explained. "The government dropped all terrorism charges against him. David Hicks in his plea bargain did plead guilty assisting a terrorist organization yet he'll be back home with his family in 9 months time."

John Walker Lindh, 26, a Marin County native, was captured in Afghanistan in November 2001 by American forces sent to topple the Taliban after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. He was charged with conspiring to kill Americans and support terrorists but pleaded guilty in 2002 to lesser offenses, including carrying weapons against U.S. forces.

Brosnahan brokered the plea deal and said it was the best he could do amid the political climate immediately after Sept. 11, but he believes the atmosphere has now changed.

"That is why we keep asking for this. The president should issue a commutation and we hope that either this president or some other president will do that," the attorney said.

Lindh had converted to Islam and went to Afghanistan to fight for the Taliban against the Northern Alliance, Brosnahan said. Lindh's parents insisted he was not aware that the Taliban later fought against the U.S. and maintained would not have participated if he did.

"It is a question of proportionality, it is a question of fairness and it is a question of the religious experience John Walker Lindh had and it was not in any way directed at the United States," Brosnahan said.

The White House referred telephone calls to the Justice Department, which declined to comment because it had not received the petition, said spokesman Dean Boyd.

Neither the president nor the department have acted on two previous commutation requests.

Lindh is currently being held in a maximum security prison in Florence, Colo., and is not allowed to communicate with the media. Brosnahan described him as a "model prisoner" and his parents said Lindh continues to study Islam in prison with the hopes of becoming a teacher.

"John has been in prison more than five years and it's time for him to come home," said Lindh's mother, Marilyn Walker.

But some U.S. military veterans are not convinced Lindh is innocent.

" I think the guy is misguided," said Vietnam veteran Rudy Ascercion," being in jail will teach him a lesson. When he gets out, he'll learn there's a value to being an American. And being a traitor is not one of them."

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