Lawyers for 1970s radical Sara Jane Olson want a Los Angeles judge to postpone her bomb-planting trial until January because of last month's terrorist attacks.

"In light of the tragic events of September 11, 2001, it is my belief that it will be difficult, if not impossible, for my client ... to get a fair trial by jury," wrote defense lawyer Shawn Snider Chapman in court papers filed Tuesday. The trial is scheduled to begin October 15.

The Los Angeles District Attorney's Office rejected any similarities between the attacks and Olson's murder conspiracy case and said prosecutors would strongly oppose any continuance.

"Sara Jane Olson is not being charged with any links to Osama bin Laden, and we don't think a jury's going to make that leap," said Jane Robison, a spokeswoman for the L.A. District Attorney's Office. "We've had nine continuances in this case. It's time to go to trial."

Olson, 54, is accused of plotting to plant pipe bombs under police cars in 1975 as a member of the Symbionese Liberation Army, the armed revolutionary group that kidnapped newspaper heiress Patty Hearst. Then known as Kathleen Soliah, Olson fled the charges and, over the next 23 years, built a new life as a suburban mother and community activist in Minnesota. She maintains she never joined the SLA nor planted the bombs and was too fearful of police reprisals to turn herself in.

Soon after the attacks last month, Olson's defense contacted jury consultants to gauge the impact of the terrorism on her case, according to defense lawyer Stuart Hanlon.

"She's charged with a terrorist bombing that could have injured people. In jurors' minds, they could make a connection," Hanlon said last month.

He added that the defense was also concerned that painting some 1970s law enforcement agents as overzealous and unlawful may not be palatable to jurors still shocked by the deaths of so many firefighters and police officers in New York.

In her motion, Chapman suggested that "the passage of time and the diversions created by the holiday season will lessen the impact of events." She also noted that other cases have been postponed because of the bombings.

One week after the bombing, the death-penalty trial of an Egyptian man accused of killing a child in Orange County was delayed after 20 percent of potential jurors said they could not be fair because of the defendant's ethnicity.

The same day, an Atlanta judge delayed the murder trial of Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin, a former Black Panther known as H. Rap Brown. Lawyers for Al-Amin, a cleric who leads a black Muslim organization, said jurors might target him because of their anger over the terrorist attacks.