James Ujaama
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Earnest James Ujaama (born 1966) is a Seattle, Washington community activist and associate of al-Qaeda.
Born in Denver, Colorado as James Thompson, he moved with his family to Seattle at the age of 5. He converted to Islam and changed his name to Ujaama. The city of Seattle gave him a key to the city and Washington state lawmakers declared June 10, 1994, James Ujaama Day for his community service.[citation needed]
While traveling in England in 1999, he is alleged to have met Abu Hamza al-Masri, a radical Muslim cleric. Ujaama also traveled to Afghanistan in 1999 to study Sharia, according to family friends.
Ujaama was arrested in Denver on July 22, 2002 as a material witness. He was transferred to a hospital in Virginia around July 29, and held there with restricted access to family or counsel until an indictment for providing material resources to al-Qaeda was returned against him in Seattle. These charges included attempting to create a camp for training terrorists near Bly, Oregon between October and December of 1999.
In April 2003, the government dropped those charges and filed a superseding complaint alleging that Ujaama brought money, computer equipment and women to Taliban officials in Afghanistan.[citation needed] In February of the following year, Ujaama pled guilty in a plea bargain: in return for a two year sentence, he would provide information for ongoing terrorism investigations -- especially for what he knew about al-Masri, whose Web site Ujaama once ran.
Ujaama only pleaded guilty after video's were uncovered by Glen Jenvey with Ujaama sat next to Abu Hamza talking about jihad.The video's were used at Ujaamas trail to force him to plead guilty and plea bargin with the FBI.see http://www.abuhamza.org.uk
Federal officials have said Ujaama's help was crucial in the 2004 indictment of al-Masri on charges of trying to establish the training camp in Bly, Oregon.[1]
In December 2006, Ujaama was arrested in Belize after violating parole in the United States [2]. He possessed a fake Mexican passport at the time of his apprehension. [3]
