You'll note the quotation marks in the headline about the convicted online terror supporter Ishaq Kanmi. When I first started following the antics of "Umar Rabie al-Khalifah, the Leader of al Qaeda in Britain" I strongly suspected he was no such thing. But the fact that he was lying about being a leader of al Qaeda never suggested to me that he wasn't dangerous. After all, this was a guy who was trolling the internet for volunteer suicide bombers to kill civilians. His worst offense was that he encouraged others to do what he himself, sadly, may never have gotten around to doing: becoming a martyr.
Kanmi and I are old acquaintances from our days on the Infovlad forum. Me as an administrator and Kanmi, using several aliases, as a cheerleader for al Qaeda. We even exchanged an email or two.
Hence, my involvement in the case was as a witness. I haven't spoken much publicly about this case because of my involvement, but it was not, as some have presumed, as an "expert witness". I had first hand knowledge of Kanmi's internet based crimes, and so that is what I testified to in court. Nothing else.
In fact, it was me that first notified the authorities about Kanmi's claims of being connected to al Qaeda and making the original death threats after tracing him to a public computer in Blackburn. Later, when Kanmi's threats were posted on an even bigger and more well connected jihad forum, the authorities took notice of him on their own.
Announcement banner posted by Kanmi of the creation of al Qaeda in Britainm
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