home

Terrorism Charges Reinstated Against James Ujaama

James Ujaama was one of the early terrorism suspects who took a deal to avoid a big jail sentence. I followed his case extensively at the time because he was arrested in Denver.

The Government initially alleged he scouted for terror camp locations in Bly, Oregon. He ended up pleading guilty only to providing cash, computers and fighters to the Taliban, in exchange for his cooperation against others. He was sentenced to two years, about one of which had been served in pre-trial detention. He's been on supervised release since 2004.

The Government was counting on Ujaama to testify at the trial of London cleric Abu Hamza al-Masri.

Ujaama, it seems, got cold feet and split to Belize using a fake Mexican passport.

On Friday, the Judge in Seattle where he pleaded guilty in 2003 revoked his plea deal. Today, in federal court in Manhattan, he pleaded guilty to the original terrorism charges lodged against him and now faces up to 30 years when sentenced.

On a related note, I still think that Condi Rice confused Ghost detainee Khaled el-Masri (also spelled al-Masri, a German shoe salesman) with the London Cleric and only ordered his release after the cleric al-Masri was arrested. By then, el-Masri had been in jail for five months.

Among the more curious details of the mix-up, if there was one: al-Masri the cleric, has one eye and a hook for hands. You would think someone would have noticed the difference between him and Khaled el-Masri before five months went by.

< Tracking Alberto Gonzales | Adelphia Rigas' Report to Federal Prison >
  • The Online Magazine with Liberal coverage of crime-related political and injustice news

  • Contribute To TalkLeft


  • Display: Sort:
    Al Qaeda is Stupid (none / 0) (#1)
    by cmpnwtr on Tue Aug 14, 2007 at 10:17:01 AM EST
    The case of James Ujaama undermines the meme that Al Qaeda operatives are smart. Have you been to Bly, Oregon? A town of maybe 150 population. I grew up a few miles from there and one of our favorite camping places is close by. Bly, Oregon is a sparsely populated place where the business of those few inhabitants and nearby ranchers is to know everyone else's business. In addition Bly inhabitants are armed to the teeth and if someone happened by who looked Middle Eastern and were firing AK-47s on their place, they would  be "toast." Bly is a place of vigilantee justice. Anyone who looks or acts strange or "un-American" is going to be history and very quickly. It seems the compelling reason to choose Bly as an Al Qaeda training ground is that the terrain looks like Afghanistan. Hahahahahaha......... Al Qaeda is nearly as stupid as the Bush administration.

    "You would think..." (none / 0) (#2)
    by Dadler on Tue Aug 14, 2007 at 12:07:48 PM EST
    Actually, with this administration, no, I wouldn't think they could get ANYthing right.