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A radical shadow THE STORY SO FAR
On Saturday the News-Press detailed the family of corrections Officer Scott Williams' six-year wait for justice. It will be at least another year and half before his accused killer, Roy C. Green, goes to trial. Compounding the family's pain are disturbing new details of the crime that imply his killer did not act alone.
Prison sources suspect convicted terrorists in
Inmate Roy C. Green would sometimes have trouble counting his change when he bought extra food from the commissary in the U.S. Penitentiary in Lompoc. Keith Boley, a former corrections officer who delivered the food, remembers that Mr. Green didn't talk a lot and was a little slow. "But he was like a sponge," Mr. Boley said. "He just took in what these other guys were saying." The "other guys" were part of a tight-knit radical Sunni Muslim prayer group that was distinct from other Muslims in the prison. The inmates -- including Mr. Green, a devout man also known as Haneef Bilal -- vented rage toward the United States and advocated holy war, or jihad, against the government, its institutions and its representatives, including corrections officers, prison sources told the News-Press. Now more than six years after Mr. Green allegedly tied two crude prison knives to his hands and ambushed guards -- killing one and seriously injuring four others -- new details have emerged hinting at a broader conspiracy with disturbing links to terrorists in the federal prison system. "I don't know about calling Green a terrorist, but there's speculation and conjecture that terrorists put him up to it," said a guard who asked that his name not be used because the U.S. Bureau of Prisons legally bars its employees from discussing individual prisoners. "They were in the same housing unit. They prayed together. They talked a lot." Whether or not terrorists goaded him into attacking, this case and a handful of others across the country troubled federal officials. Long before the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, they began isolating radical Islamic inmates who had been convicted of terrorism within the prison system. At Lompoc after Officer Scott Williams was killed, prison officials apparently isolated at least two individuals they believed might have had a role in the attack, including convicted terrorist Mahmud Abouhalima and former Black Liberation Army member Sekou Odinga.
"Over the past couple of years we have undertaken a variety of initiatives in this area, but we cannot discuss the particulars for security reasons," said Traci Billingsley, a spokeswoman for the Bureau of Prisons. "Our practices in institution security and inmate management are geared toward the prevention of any violence, criminal behavior, disruptive behavior, or other threats to institution security or public safety, including the radicalization of inmates." She would not comment on whether the attack at Lompoc had links to terrorists. "We do not comment on pending cases," Ms. Billingsley said. Critics of the theory that convicted terrorists are recruiting and indoctrinating members in the prison system have charged that the idea feeds into prejudice against Muslims. They also point out that some conservatives and Christian organizations have made much of the connections without clear evidence. J. Michael Waller, a professor of International Communications at the Institute of World Politics in Washington, D.C., said reports of recruiting by convicted terrorists within the prison system may be overstated. But Mr. Waller, who recently testified at a Senate subcommittee hearing on the topic, also said prisoners are ripe for possible recruitment. There is a long tradition -- from Russian revolutionaries to Muslim Brotherhood members -- of radicalization behind bars. "Prisoners often have gone through years, even decades, of political or religious indoctrination that is extremely hostile to our society," Mr. Waller said. "When they get out, they are often unemployable and very angry. They have a very strong ideological motivation to hate the (political) system." The issue of religious practice in prison is a delicate one, but one that has to be addressed, he said. "It's not Islam that's the problem," Mr. Waller said. "It's when Islam is politicized and radicalized that it becomes a problem. Islam can be part of the solution, really. It can have a calming effect and a salvific effect for someone fighting a spiritual battle in their own mind and soul."
NOBODY'S PUPPET
When Mr. Green's previous defense team became aware of investigators' suspicions, they saw an opening for their client. The attorneys wanted to show that Mr. Green -- someone who, according to IQ tests, was of modest intelligence at best -- had been coerced into the attack. In 1999, the defense attorneys requested that government investigators show them any evidence indicating the involvement of others in the attack. They specifically wanted information about two inmates in the prayer group: someone they referred to in court as "Mr. O" -- Sekou Odinga, whom prosecutors in New York once referred to as "the top most terrorist criminal in the country" -- and Mahmud Abouhalima, a convicted terrorist serving 240 years for his part in the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center. Mr. Green bristled at his defense attorneys' strategy. He told them he did not "want to go down the terrorist-act road." He wanted to fight the charges, saying he didn't kill anyone. And just as forcefully, Mr. Green argued he was never anyone's "puppet." "No one influences me, no one, not even my mother, I walk alone," he wrote in a letter to the court asking that new attorneys be assigned to represent him. In May he got his wish. A new defense team was assigned to the case. The new attorneys say they have not yet mapped out their legal strategy, and they would not comment on the case except to ask that anything written about Mr. Green be fair. Federal prosecutors were equally tight-lipped. In a written response to questions from the News-Press, the U.S. Attorney's Office didn't directly answer the question of whether there may be a broader conspiracy. Despite the involvement of more than 50 FBI agents in preliminary investigations and six years of legal wrangling, Mr. Green remains the only one indicted for the crime, and federal prosecutors have never leveled any allegations that this was an act of terrorism or committed at the behest of anyone else. "Roy Green is the only defendant charged with the murder of Scott Williams. We cannot comment or speculate on anyone who is not charged in the case," said U.S. Attorney spokesman Thom Mrozek. But at the prison, it is widely believed that others were involved, according to guards and officials interviewed by the News-Press. "There was strong suspicion that Odinga might have been involved, but there wasn't enough to indict him," said one former high-ranking prison official. "As for Abouhalima, there were rumors about him, too. Look, from a management standpoint they were all very dangerous. They wouldn't have been where they were if they weren't, but these guys in particular -- with their goals and ideals -- were a little more dangerous."
A POLITICAL PRISONER
Mr. Green, Mr. Odinga and Mr. Abouhalima were all in the same cellblock, according to prison sources. Guards said Mr. Odinga, a powerfully built man and committed revolutionary, was known for being obstinate, someone other inmates avoided. In 1998, when he was brought before a federal grand jury in Los Angeles to answer questions about the Lompoc killing, Mr. Odinga sat silently. A professed soldier in the "New Afrikan Liberation Movement," he declared that he was a prisoner of war and not obliged to testify before a criminal grand jury. His supporters said he was singled out for punishment after the attack. "Mr. Odinga has been falsely accused of conspiring with a prisoner who allegedly killed the guard," said Shiriki Unganisha of Kansas City, Mo., in a 1998 letter to the director of the Bureau of Prisons on Mr. Odinga's behalf. Contacted recently, Ms. Unganisha, a black liberation activist and freelance writer, said Mr. Odinga was punished, placed in solitary confinement 23 hours a day and given "no contact" orders, which prohibited him from receiving visitors. His attorney, Roger Wareham of New York City, said that though Mr. Odinga briefly shared a cell with Mr. Green, they barely knew each other. Mr. Odinga refused to answer questions from the federal grand jury investigating Officer Williams' killing, but he was never held in contempt, Mr. Wareham said. Mr. Odinga was eventually transferred out of Lompoc and is now in a federal prison at Marion, Ill., where he remains in a 23-hour-a-day lockdown. Mr. Wareham said he did not believe Mr. Odinga was transferred because of the 1997 attack, but because of his status as "a political prisoner." Mr. Odinga's radical political history dates to the late 1960s, when he broke from the New York Black Panther Party and was one of the original members of the Black Liberation Army. The splinter group embraced violent attacks against the police as part of a war of liberation for blacks, with the goal of establishing a black nation in five Southern states. According to journalist and author John Castellucci's book "The Big Dance," Mr. Odinga helped form the core of a group that became known as "The Family," which robbed Brinks armored cars in the late 1970s and early 1980s. "One reason Odinga was successful in the role of stickup man was nerve: He was cool, self-possessed, and daring," Mr. Castellucci wrote. Mr. Odinga's physique and "self control contributed to his ability to command obedience," wrote Mr. Castellucci. "Odinga seldom raised his voice or lost his temper, but when he did show anger, it was an intimidating sight." During his state trial, an assistant district attorney in Queens, N.Y., described Mr. Odinga as the "top most terrorist criminal in the country."
STIRRING THINGS UP
Suspicion in the Williams case also fell on Mr. Abouhalima, who was known to be charming and helpful. But prison sources said the tall, redheaded Egyptian could turn on a dime and become quite intimidating. "We knew he was stirring things up," said a guard who worked in the cellblock. About four months after the attack, UCSB professor Mark Jurgensmeyer went into the prison to interview Mr. Abouhalima. Along with his conviction in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, federal court documents in the case against bomber Ramzi Yousef say Mr. Abouhalima was part of a terrorist cell based in New York City with connections to al-Qaeda. A member of the New York-based terrorist cell was convicted in the assassination of Rabbi Meir Kahane. Other members were also convicted in the so-called "day of terror" plan to blow up the Holland Tunnel, the George Washington Bridge and the United Nations in New York City, according to federal court documents. After his conviction in the World Trade Center bombing case, Mr. Abouhalima eventually wound up at the maximum-security prison at Lompoc. There he lived in the same cellblock with at least two other members of the terrorist cell who plotted the 1993 bombing, including fellow convicted plotter Mohammed Salameh. They were all part of the same prayer group, prison sources said. When Mr. Jurgensmeyer arrived for his interview with Mr. Abouhalima in August 1997, he was unaware of the killing in April and was surprised by the level of tension. "I remember talking to the warden (David Rardin), and he said there had been some difficulty at the prison," said Mr. Jurgensmeyer, a religious studies professor whose book "Terror in the Mind of God" looked at the religious motivation behind terrorist attacks. He included a section on Mr. Abouhalima. The warden had cleared out the dinning area and brought in the shackled prisoner surrounded by eight guards. The convicted terrorist was arguing about his rights, said Mr. Jurgensmeyer, who thought the interview was going to be scrapped. The heated discussion went back and forth until finally the guards agreed to uncuff his hands. "And then he was all sweetness and light," Mr. Jurgensmeyer said. Afterward, the professor asked the warden, Mr. Rardin, about the extra precautions. He was told there had been "an incident and we were concerned about your safety." When Mr. Jurgensmeyer pressed for details, the warden told him he couldn't say much because of prisoners' privacy rights but that there had been a murder. He wouldn't say if Mr. Abouhalima had been involved. Mr. Abouhalima was eventually moved to the "supermax" prison in Florence, Colo., the most secure of the nine maximum-security federal prisons in the United States. Mr. Abouhalima and Mr. Salameh were placed under "Special Administrative Measures" before 2001, restricting their access to other prisoners, according to court transcripts in the 2001 case against two men convicted in the 1998 bombing of two U.S. embassies in Africa. Those measures were not in place at the time of the attack that claimed Officer Williams' life. In a 1998 letter to the suspects' attorneys in the embassy bombing case, U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald explained that the measures were justified because a suspected terrorist either awaiting trial or already in prison could instigate acts of violence from his cell. "To allow the defendants to freely socialize among themselves without an officer of the court present, or allow unrestricted contact visits with persons designated on a visitor list without advance notice of the visit, would be completely irresponsible . . ."
STRATEGIC THREAT GROUPS
The Bureau of Prisons monitors more than 2,000 groups within the federal prison system that they've dubbed "Strategic Threat Groups," according to prison sources. Many of those groups are simply prison gangs. But individuals and groups that the government classifies as domestic or international terrorists are also on that list. "Anyone or any groups that espouse violence or incite rage or have a terrorist history would be on that list," said a former Lompoc prison official who did not want his name used because he said he was still bound by Bureau of Prison policy that prohibits its employees from discussing individual prisoners. During a Senate subcommittee hearing in October, John Pistole, an assistant director for the FBI's counterterrorism division, testified that al-Qaeda training manuals targeted prisoners for recruitment. "These terrorists seek to exploit our freedom to exercise religion to their advantage by using radical forms of Islam to recruit operatives," Mr. Pistole said. "Unfortunately, U.S. correctional institutions are a viable venue for such radicalization and recruitment." Harry Lapin, director of the Bureau of Prisons, echoed those concerns. "We know that inmates are particularly vulnerable to recruitment by terrorists, and we must guard against the spread of terrorism and extremist ideologies," Mr. Lapin testified. "Our agency has taken significant measure to combat radicalization of prisoners by other inmates." He went on to say that inmates with terrorist ties are monitored and efforts are made to isolate them from other inmates. There were several cases in which convicted terrorists were caught either passing messages to stage attacks to their supporters outside or lashing out against guards in prison. In one case, Egyptian Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman -- known as the "Blind Sheikh" and serving a life sentence -- allegedly sent a message to the group al Gamma'a Islamiya, which massacred tourists visiting the pyramids in Egypt, according to a federal court transcript of another terrorist trial. Mr. Abouhalima had been the Blind Sheikh's driver in New York. Two other men later convicted for their roles in bombing the U.S. embassies in Africa were also convicted of attempted murder of a guard at a federal detention center in New York after stabbing him in the eye with a comb sharpened into a knife. As a matter of policy, federal authorities have transferred most convicted terrorists to the "supermax" prison in Colorado following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
WHAT TO BELIEVE
Officer Williams' widow, Kristy Williams, said no one has answered why her husband was killed. For more than six years, she's been waiting to learn the reason, but she will have to wait until early 2005 before the trial begins. "Frankly, I don't know whom to believe," said Mrs. Williams, who didn't want to speculate about the possibility of other people's involvement in her husband's death. Officer Mark Stephenson, who was stabbed in the neck during the attack, wondered if anyone would be able to find out who else might have been involved. "The only person who can answer that is Roy Green, and he isn't talking." |
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