The judge called Mr. Leary a vengeful and self-aggrandizing man with an inflated view of his intelligence who knowingly carried two firebombs, built from mayonnaise jars, kitchen timers, batteries and flashbulbs, onto the two Manhattan trains. Forty-eight people were injured, 14 seriously, including himself.

Two teen-age students were injured in the first bombing, on Dec. 15, 1994, on a No. 3 train at 145th Street and Lenox Avenue in Harlem. Investigators at first thought one student had been carrying the device.

Six days later, at 1:35 P.M., a second device went off in the sixth car of a No. 4 train packed with people returning to work from lunch and Christmas shopping.

Panicked straphangers scrambled to the doors, trampling those who had fallen in the rush or were crawling as they tried to escape the scorching heat. Once outside on a platform filling with smoke, they rolled around or patted themselves and others to put out the flames.

The sentencing was a relief to victims, but some said it was just one step in a long recovery.

"I hate to see a man lose his liberty," said Winfield Edey, a former truck driver from Far Rockaway, Queens, who receives physical therapy three times a week to regain full use of his hands and feet. "But what Mr. Leary did to me and the other people in that train is unforgivable and he has to pay the penalty for that."

Joseph Schendelman, a former bank supervisor, said his facial scars have healed but he continued to see a psychologist twice a month.

"I'm satisfied," said Mr. Schendelman of Linden, N.J. "It's not going to take away from our pains and sufferings, but to know that he would be away for a long time is good."