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30–597 PDF 2007

S. Hrg. 109–954

PRISON RADICALIZATION: ARE TERRORIST CELLS

FORMING IN U.S. CELL BLOCKS?

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON 

HOMELAND SECURITY AND 

GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS 

UNITED STATES SENATE

ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

SEPTEMBER 19, 2006

Available via http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/senate

Printed for the use of the 

Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs

(

(II)

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS 

SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine, Chairman 

TED STEVENS, Alaska 

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio 

NORM COLEMAN, Minnesota 

TOM COBURN, Oklahoma 

LINCOLN D. CHAFEE, Rhode Island 

ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah 

PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico 

JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia 

JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut 

CARL LEVIN, Michigan 

DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii 

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware 

MARK DAYTON, Minnesota 

FRANK LAUTENBERG, New Jersey 

MARK PRYOR, Arkansas

JENNIFER C. BOONE, FBI Detailee 

DAVID K. PORTER, Counsel 

MELVIN D. ALBRITTON, Counsel 

MICHAEL L. ALEXANDER, Minority Staff Director 

ERIC P. ANDERSEN, Minority Professional Staff Member 

TRINA DRIESSNACK TYRER, Chief Clerk 

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Opening statements: Page 

Senator Collins ................................................................................................. 1

Senator Carper ................................................................................................. 3

Prepared statement: 

Senator Lieberman ........................................................................................... 35

WITNESSES 

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 2006

Frank J. Cilluffo, Associate Vice President for Homeland Security, and Director, Homeland Security Policy Institute, The George Washington University ......................................................................................................................... 6

Gregory B. Saathoff, M.D., Executive Director, Critical Incident Analysis 

Group, and Associate Professor of Rsearch, School of Medicine, University 

of Virginia ............................................................................................................. 9

Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, Senior Consultant, Gerard Group International, 

and Co-Chairman, Counterterrorism Foundation ............................................. 13

John M. Vanyur, Assistant Director, Correctional Programs Division, Federal 

Bureau of Prisons, U.S. Department of Justice ................................................. 22

Donald N. Van Duyn, Deputy Assistant Director, Counterterrorism Division, 

Federal Bureau of Investigation, U.S. Department of Justice ......................... 24

Javed Ali, Senior Intelligence Officer, Office of Intelligence and Analysis, 

U.S. Department of Homeland Security ............................................................. 27 

ALPHABETICAL LIST OF WITNESSES

Ali, Javed: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 27

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 79

Cilluffo, Frank J.: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 6

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 37

Gartenstein-Ross, Daveed: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 13

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 57

Saathoff, Gregory B., M.D.: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 9

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 46

Van Duyn, Donald N.: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 24

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 74

Vanyur, John M.: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 22

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 66

APPENDIX 

Excerpts from Islamic Guidelines for Individual and Social Reform .................. 83

Out of the Shadows: Getting Ahead of Prisoner Radicalization .......................... 86

Responses to post-hearing questions for the Record from: 

Mr. Cilluffo ........................................................................................................ 119

Mr. Saathoff ...................................................................................................... 123

Mr. Gartenstein-Ross ....................................................................................... 128

Mr. Vanyur ........................................................................................................ 131

Mr. Van Duyn ................................................................................................... 147

Mr. Ali ............................................................................................................... 157

(1)

PRISON RADICALIZATION: ARE TERRORIST 

CELLS FORMING IN U.S. CELL BLOCKS? 

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 2006

U.S. SENATE, COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY

AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS, Washington, DC. 

The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:02 a.m., in room 

342, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Susan M. Collins, Chairman of the Committee, presiding. 

Present: Senators Collins and Carper. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN COLLINS 

Chairman COLLINS. The Committee will come to order. 

For the past 5 years, the Federal Government has attempted to 

prevent terrorists from entering our country from abroad. Our 

homeland security efforts have made it increasingly difficult for foreign terrorists to infiltrate and operate in the United States. Increased border security and screening of overseas airline passengers, while critical to help keep out foreign terrorists, do not, 

however, protect us from home-grown terrorists. The rise of domestic terrorist cells inspired by but not linked directly to al Qaeda is 

an emerging threat to our national security. 

This morning, the Committee will examine a deep pool of potential homegrown operatives, American prisons. Our corrections facilities, Federal, State, and local, provide fertile grounds for 

radicalization and recruitment efforts. We have seen this problem 

in the formation of such prison gangs as the Mexican mafia and 

the white supremacist group, the Aryan Brotherhood. And we see 

it in the focus of our hearing today, the spread in prison of an extremist form of Islam dedicated to committing acts of terrorism. 

Let me be clear. Our concern is not with prison inmates converting to Islam. For many converts, this religion brings the direction and purpose their lives previously lacked. Our concern is instead with those who would use prisons as places to indoctrinate 

inmates with a hateful ideology that incites adherents to commit 

violent acts. 

We need to learn more about the process of radicalization. For 

some inmates, the conversion to Islam sets their lives on a lasting 

path that shuns violence and criminality. What is it, then, that 

leads other inmates to adopt the extremist interpretation that 

teaches violence against those of different beliefs? How can prison 

authorities identify the teachings that incite violence while respecting the right of inmates to have access to religious materials? What 

2

1The report appears in the Appendix on page 86. 

training and skills do corrections officers need to be able to recognize radicalization and recruitment efforts? 

A current case demonstrates that these concerns are not hypothetical. Kevin James is an American citizen incarcerated in California for armed robbery. A convert to Islam in prison, this selfstyled Imam founded an organization called JIS, the Arabic initials 

of the Assembly for Authentic Islam. Based upon his radical interpretation of Islam, Kevin James preached that it was the duty of 

JIS members to target his perceived enemies of Islam, including 

U.S. military personnel and Jewish and non-Jewish supporters of 

Israel, for violent attacks. Kevin James recruited JIS members 

among his fellow inmates. 

One of Kevin James’ radicalized converts, upon being released 

from prison, allegedly recruited other members at a Los Angeles 

area mosque. His group reportedly sought to acquire automatic 

weapons, firearms with silencers, and explosives. They conducted 

surveillance on military installations, synagogues, and the Israeli 

consulate. Allegedly, they financed their operations by committing 

at least 11 armed robberies throughout Southern California. 

Kevin James and his accomplices now face trial on terrorism 

charges. This terrorist plot was only uncovered when a JIS operative inadvertently dropped a cell phone at one of the crime scenes. 

The data retrieved from that phone allowed the FBI-led investigators to trace the crimes from the gang committing the robberies 

back to the prison and ultimately back to Kevin James. It was only 

then that prison officials learned the true nature of JIS and the 

scope of the conspiracy that had developed within the prison walls. 

We have to wonder how many other such conspiracies are taking 

shape under the radar in other prisons. 

During our first panel today, experts from the George Washington University and the University of Virginia will release a report by their Prisoner Radicalization Task Force. The report, titled 

‘‘Out of the Shadows: Getting Ahead of Prisoner Radicalization,’’1

is one of the first to address religious radicalization in American 

prisons. I am pleased that we have the two chairmen of this task 

force with us today. 

We will also have a witness who will give us the inside view 

based on his experience in working for an Islamic charity that has 

ties to terrorist groups and that has been listed as supporting terrorism financially. This individual will tell us about a prison literature program run by this charity. 

We will then look at the government’s response to radicalization 

with a panel of Federal experts who will discuss, among other 

things, the Correctional Intelligence Initiative, a positive program 

at the Federal level. But we have to remember that most prisoners 

are held at the State level, not in Federal prisons. 

We will discuss with this panel the challenges that we face. For 

example, how can we, while preserving civil liberties, track released inmates identified as radicalized as they move from one jurisdiction to another? How can one State’s corrections system, having identified a particular chaplain, volunteer, or inmate as a 

teacher who incites others to violence, effectively share that inforVerDate 0ct 09 2002 08:12 Aug 24, 2007 Jkt 030597 PO 00000 Frm 00006 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\30597.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
3

mation with other systems should that clergy member move to another system or if an inmate be transferred to another prison? 

This is an issue with profound national security implications that 

reach into virtually every State and a great many cities throughout 

America. We must find a way to bring every level of government 

with a corrections system into a unified effort that addresses our 

national security while respecting the autonomy and authority of 

the individual jurisdictions. 

I would note that the criminal gang that sprang from Kevin 

James’ teaching of violent jihad was centered in Torrance, California. Hence, the investigation that resulted was given the code 

name ‘‘Torrancial Rain,’’ a code name that well describes the storm 

of terrorism that could result if the radicalization of prison inmates 

goes unchecked. 

We are very pleased today to have the distinguished Senator 

from Delaware, Senator Carper, acting as the Ranking Minority 

Member at Senator Lieberman’s request. Welcome, Senator Carper. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR CARPER 

Senator CARPER. Thanks, Madam Chairman. I said to Senator 

Lieberman, this is a little bit like Pee Wee Reese pinch-hitting for 

Mickey Mantle. But I got up early this morning to catch the train 

and was driving to the train station this morning in Wilmington. 

I turned on NPR, and there you were. 

Chairman COLLINS. Really? 

Senator CARPER. There you were, in living color. It is a pleasure 

to sit here and to pinch hit for Senator Lieberman. 

I had a busy weekend. You probably did, too. Among the folks 

I met with, I met with a number of people whose faith is Islam, 

and we talked about radicalization and how in my own faith, I am 

Protestant, but we have some people in our faith who have tried 

to hijack it in order to meet their own ends. We have seen Catholic 

priests abuse young people, but that doesn’t make Catholicism bad 

or wrong, in the same way we have seen folks that have taken the 

major faith of Islam and tried to pervert it for their own means. 

I think as we start today’s hearings, it is always important to remember that most of the people who are Muslim and whose faith 

is Islam are good. In this country, they are good, law-abiding citizens, and they really just want the same things that the rest of us 

want. So as we approach this hearing, I think it is important 

maybe just to remind us all of that. 

Having said that, I thank you for the chance to be here. We appreciate our witnesses coming today, and we look forward to their 

testimony as well. 

This is obviously an important and timely hearing as we commemorated just last week the fifth anniversary of the September 

11 attacks and the loss of 3,000 people. Those attacks, as we know, 

were perpetrated by 19 hijackers who grew up and were indoctrinated with their radical views overseas. Last week, we had Secretary Chertoff before us and some homeland security experts who 

came by to testify, and some of the discussion focused on the threat 

of home-grown terrorism and whether the next terrorists who seek 

to do harm to us might actually come from within our own borders. 

4

While home-grown Islamic terrorism might not be as much of a 

threat here as it is in, say, Europe or some other places, we ignore 

the threat that does exist at our peril. We need to look no further 

than the experiences of our allies in Great Britain to see the danger we could be facing down the road or down the railroad track. 

I understand that many of those arrested this past summer in the 

plot to blow up planes on the way to the United States were British 

citizens. British citizens also played a role in the deadly transit attacks that took a number of lives in London last July. 

So I think it is important that we address what contributes to 

the spread of radical or violent views before we have major problems on our hands, as well. 

I was disturbed, as I am sure many of us were, as I prepared 

for this hearing to learn how extensive of a problem we may already have, at least in some communities within our country. Islamic radicalism and other extreme ideologies prey on the minds 

of the angry and the dispossessed. America’s crowded prison systems are full of that type of person, unfortunately, and are probably the ideal place for someone with dangerous views to attract 

and foster new recruits. At least some people have figured that out. 

As a former governor who was once very much involved in our 

own corrections system in our State, I know that religion and other 

diversions, like job training, are an important part of keeping prisons safer and helping to ensure that when inmates are released, 

and most all of them will be, they come out of those prisons as better people, not as better criminals. 

In our prisons, Madam Chairman, we used to say that we seek 

to focus on a variety of inmates’ needs—their educational needs, as 

many of them had little if any education, their substance abuse 

problems that they faced, their needs for job training so they would 

have a job skill when they walked out of there, working with them 

on life skills, just knowing that they had a schedule and had to get 

up in the morning and have breakfast and go to work and have 

people who expected something from them. We sought to meet 

their spiritual needs, as well. We tried to touch all of those bases 

before we let 95, 96, 97, 98 percent of them go, to leave and to go 

back out into the community. 

I am certain that the vast majority of those who go to prisons 

to preach or to seek converts are good people quite literally doing 

the Lord’s work. I know a number of them in my State, and you 

probably do, too, and that is certainly the case in most instances. 

I understand that the Federal Bureau of Prisons and other agencies have done some work aimed at keeping Islamic radicals out of 

the Federal prison system and attempting to ensure that extreme 

versions of the Qur’an and other writings don’t make their way into 

the hands of impressionable prisoners, and that is good news. But 

the vast majority of prisoners at risk of being influenced by dangerous ideologies are serving their time in State or local institutions. 

I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today about steps 

that we need to take and steps that those who run our prisons 

need to take to prevent prison systems from becoming even more 

susceptible than they currently are to the spread of the kind of 

thinking that leads to tragedies like September 11. 

5

Thank you, Madam Chairman.

PREPARED STATEMENT OF SENATOR CARPER 

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thanks as well to our witnesses for being here today 

and for helping us shed some light on this important issue. 

This is a very timely hearing. Just last week, we commemorated the fifth anniversary of the September 11 attacks and the three thousand lives that were taken that 

day. 

Those attacks, as we all know, were perpetrated by 19 hijackers who grew up and 

were indoctrinated with their radical views overseas. 

Last week, we had Secretary Chertoff and some homeland security experts in to 

testify and some of the discussion focused on the threat of homegrown terrorism and 

whether the next terrorist who seeks to do us harm might come from our own 

shores. 

While homegrown Islamic terrorism might not be as much of a threat here as it 

is in Europe or elsewhere, we ignore the threat that does exist at our peril. 

We need look no further than the experiences of some of our allies to see the danger we could be facing down the road. I understand that many of those arrested in 

recent months in failed plots in Great Britain and Canada were actually British and 

Canadian citizens. Homegrown terrorists also played a role in the deadly transit attacks that took hundreds of lives in attacks in London and Madrid. 

It’s important, then, that we address what contributes to the spread of radical or 

violent views before we have a major problem on our hands as well. 

I was disturbed as I prepared for this hearing to learn how extensive a problem 

we may already have, at least in some communities. 

Islamic radicalism and other extreme ideologies prey on the minds of the angry 

and the dispossessed. America’s crowded prison systems are full of that type of person, unfortunately, and are probably the ideal place for someone with dangerous 

views to attract and foster new recruits. At least some people have figured that out. 

As a former governor who was once responsible for running my state’s prison system, I know that religion and other diversions like job training are an important 

part of keeping prisons safer and helping ensure that inmates are better people once 

they get out. I’m certain that the vast majority of those who go to prisons to preach 

or seek converts are good people quite literally doing the Lord’s work. That’s certainly the case in Delaware. 

I understand that the Federal Bureau of Prisons and other agencies have done 

some work aimed at keeping Islamic radicals out of the federal prison system and 

ensuring that extreme versions of the Koran and other writing don’t make their way 

into the hands of impressionable prisoners. 

That’s good news, but the vast majority of prisoners at risk of being influenced 

by dangerous ideologies are serving their time in state or local institutions. I look 

forward to hearing from our witnesses today about steps we need to take and steps 

those who run our prisons need to take to prevent prison systems from becoming 

even more susceptible than they currently are to the spread of the kind of thinking 

that leads to tragedies like September 11.

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you, Senator. 

I would now like to introduce the witnesses on our first panel. 

We are very pleased to have each of you here today. 

Our first witness, Frank Cilluffo, is the Associate Vice President 

for Homeland Security and Director of the Homeland Security Policy Institute at the George Washington University. He currently 

serves as the Co-Chair of the Prisoner Radicalization Task Force, 

which as I mentioned was jointly sponsored by George Washington 

and the University of Virginia’s Critical Incident Analysis Group. 

Mr. Cilluffo joined GW from the White House, where he served as 

Special Assistant to the President for Homeland Security. 

Our second witness, Dr. Gregory Saathoff, serves as the Executive Director of the Critical Incident Analysis Group and is an associate professor at the University of Virginia. He currently serves as 

the other Co-Chair with Mr. Cilluffo of the Prisoner Radicalization 

Task Force. He is also on the Research Advisory Board for the 

FBI’s National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime. Over the 

6

1The prepared statement of Mr. Cilluffo appears in the Appendix on page 37. 

past 15 years, he has provided psychiatric consultations to inmates 

in more than 10 Federal and State prisons in the United States. 

Our final witness on this panel, Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, is the 

Senior Consultant for the Gerard Group International and CoChair of the Counterterrorism Foundation. He converted to Islam 

in his early 20s and eventually went to work for the head U.S. office of the Al Haramain Islamic Foundation, a group later designated by the U.S. Government as a financier of terrorism. 

I welcome all of you here today. We very much appreciate sharing your expertise, and Mr. Cilluffo, we will start with you. 

TESTIMONY OF FRANK J. CILLUFFO,1 ASSOCIATE VICE PRESIDENT FOR HOMELAND SECURITY, AND DIRECTOR, HOMELAND SECURITY POLICY INSTITUTE, THE GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY 

Mr. CILLUFFO. Madam Chairman, Senator Carper, thank you for 

the opportunity to testify before you today. Your initiative in pushing to the fore the issue of prison radicalization is crucial. Proactive 

consideration of this challenge and a carefully calibrated response 

will place the United States ahead of the curve and bolster national 

security. We simply cannot wait until we are faced with the need 

to manage a crisis. 

In today’s context, radicalization is ‘‘the process by which inmates adopt extreme views, including beliefs that violent measures 

need to be taken for political or religious purposes.’’ This is a subset of a more general phenomenon of radicalization that has manifested itself in a series of terrorist attacks and activities, including 

the bombings in Madrid, in London, as well as the thwarted terrorist activities in Canada earlier this year. 

The larger terrorist threat is the tapestry by which prisoner 

radicalization must be studied, but that fabric is ever changing. Al 

Qaeda in its classic form is now a degraded entity, with many of 

its remaining key figures on the run. However, it has franchised 

itself across the globe with its franchises prepared to act locally 

and largely independently, in effect, a network of networks. We 

have also seen the emergence of a leaderless movement, marked 

significantly by self-enlistment and taking its inspiration from al 

Qaeda classic to join the global Salafi jihad. 

The Internet has fueled this development, building in essence a 

virtual umma, wherein chat rooms have replaced the smoke-filled 

bars of le Carre ́ novels. Ironically, it is when home-grown groups 

attempt to reach out to al Qaeda that they have been caught in key 

instances. Fortunately, these groups have not yet attained a higher 

level of competence. 

Whether beyond prison walls or inside them, it is essential to 

better understand the life cycle of a terrorist, specifically, the process by which an individual becomes motivated to listen to radical 

ideas, read about them, enlist oneself or respond to terrorist recruiting efforts, and ultimately act upon those ideas. This transition from sympathizer to activist will be addressed in greater detail 

by my colleague, Dr. Saathoff. 

7

Prison radicalization is not a new threat. To the contrary, prisons 

have always been an incubator for radical ideas, in part because 

there is a captive audience. Recall that Hitler wrote Mein Kampf

while in prison, and Stalin while himself incarcerated recruited inmates to power the Bolshevik Revolution. The founder of Arkan’s 

Tigers, who took part in the ethnic cleansing of Bosnia in the 

1990s, was just a petty criminal until he spent time in Western Europe prisons. The spiritual philosopher of al Qaeda, Sayyid Qutb, 

wrote the radical Islamist manifesto Milestones Along the Road

while in an Egyptian prison. Al-Zarqawi, initially merely a petty 

criminal, rose to leadership while imprisoned in Jordan. 

Of course, religious radicalization is not unique to Islam and remains the exception rather than the rule, irrespective of the faith 

at issue. 

Five months ago, GW’s Homeland Security Policy Institute and 

UVA’s Critical Incident Analysis Group convened a dedicated allvolunteer task force encompassing a variety of subject matter experts to do a deep dive into this issue, some of whom are here 

today—Abdullah Ansary, Steve Herrick, Thurgood Marshall, Jr., 

and all of whom should be thanked for their time and insights. Our 

goal was to examine radicalization in prisons from a multi-dimensional perspective rather than studying the issue through a single 

lens or solely from a law enforcement or intelligence perspective. 

During the course of our work, we heard from imams and chaplains and brought together officials at all levels of government with 

scholars of religion and behavioral science experts. The aim was to 

integrate insights from each of these professions and recast their 

distinct lenses on this issue as a prism. Our study led us to conclude that an objective risk assessment is urgently needed in order 

to better understand the nature of the threat. Although we have 

snippets of data, we still don’t have a sense of how these various 

pixels fit together as a mosaic in the big picture. Simply put, we 

don’t know what we don’t know. 

We urge you to establish a multidisciplinary commission to investigate this issue in depth and to advance our understanding of 

the nature of the threat and lay the groundwork for effective and 

proactive prevention and response measures. 

To date, select cases from the well known, such as Richard Reid 

and the New Folsum Prison case and Sheik Rahman, to the lesser 

known, such as El Rukn or the extremist Christian group Covenant, Sword, and Arm of the Lord, have revealed connections between former prisoners and terrorism. Each held the potential to 

be a high-consequence event, and authorities have attested that 

these cases would appear to be just the tip of the iceberg, though 

they cannot discuss ongoing investigations publicly in great detail. 

The potential scope of our challenge is considerable. America’s 

prison population is the world’s largest, at over 2 million. Our incarceration rate is the world’s highest. Ninety-three percent of U.S. 

inmates are in State and local prisons and jails. The figures for 

California alone are staggering. Facilities are hugely overcrowded, 

operating at 200 percent capacity. Wardens understandably have 

their hands full dealing with day-to-day operations and safety 

issues alone. And prisoners with radical Islamic religious views 

often conduct themselves as model prisoners, so wardens and other 

8

prison staff who are already overburdened may have little incentive 

to focus on these inmates. 

Despite such overstretch, California officials have demonstrated 

an impressive level of resolve and commitment to countering prisoner radicalization. Arizona and New York also have been forwardleaning in their approach. However, even in these proactive jurisdictions, publicized successes may be due in no small part to luck, 

as you mentioned earlier, Madam Chairman. 

In short, strides have been made, but disconnects remain. Crucially, local information has yet to fully find its way into regional 

and national intelligence processes and networks, and strategic 

analysis is not yet fused with investigatory efforts. The old adage, 

do you string them up or do you string them along, still has not 

been 100 percent resolved. 

Complicating the matter, there is currently no database, as you 

mentioned, Madam Chairman, to track inmates after release or to 

identify inmates associated with radical groups and no comprehensive database exists to track religious service providers who are 

known to expose inmates to radical religious rhetoric. 

Compounding the threat by Islamic radicalization is the established presence of violent gangs and extremist Christian groups in 

prisons. Some of these groups have found common cause with extremist Muslim groups who share their hostility toward the U.S. 

Government and Israel, the enemy of my enemy is my friend effect. 

It should go without saying that religion may have a tremendously constructive impact upon inmates, imbuing them with a 

sense of discipline and purpose, among other things. Prisoners have 

a legal right to practice their religion, and prisons are legally 

bound to provide for inmate worship. Unfortunately, a shortage of 

suitably qualified Muslim religious service providers has opened 

the door to under-qualified and radical chaplains to enter prisons. 

In fact, prisoners often take on this role themselves. Their converts 

may in large part have had no prior exposure to Islam and have 

no means to put the radical message into context. The only version 

some may ever learn is a cut-and-paste version of the Qur’an that 

incorporates violent prison gang culture, known as jailhouse Islam 

or Prislam. 

Currently, prayer leaders and religious service providers only require endorsement by local organizations, and there is no consistently applied standard or procedure to determine what reading material is appropriate to enter the prison system. Radical literature 

and extremist translations and interpretations of the Qur’an have 

been distributed to prisoners by groups suspected or known to support terrorism. 

The threat posed by prisoner radicalization does not end when 

inmates are paroled or released. Former inmates are vulnerable to 

radicalization and recruitment because many leave prison with 

very little financial or social support. By providing for prisoners in 

their time of greatest need, radical organizations can build upon 

the loyalty developed during the individual’s time in prison, and 

this is an oft-used tactic by gangs and white supremacist groups. 

The challenge of prison radicalization is by no means unique to 

the United States. The problem is a global one, and moving forward information sharing between and among the United States 

9

1The prepared statement of Dr. Saathoff appears in the Appendix on page 46. 

and other countries will be crucial. Others’ experience offers us an 

opportunity to stay ahead of the curve by learning, adapting, and 

applying the lessons of what has worked elsewhere and what has 

not. 

Moving forward, the most fundamental imperative in my view as 

well as that of the task force is for Congress to establish a commission to investigate this issue in depth. Only then will we better understand the full breadth and depth of the threat and hence respond accordingly and better prioritize our resources. All relevant 

perspectives must feed into this endeavor. No one profession alone 

is equipped to analyze and recommend change. And throughout, 

the practice of religion should be given fulsome consideration and 

weight while means of preventing the spread of radical ideology in 

a religious context are studied. 

We would urge that the commission accord the following core 

issues priority status: Information sharing between and among 

agencies at all levels of government involved in managing inmates 

and monitoring radical groups; steps to ensure the legitimacy of Islamic endorsing agencies so as to ensure a reliable and effective 

process of providing religious services to Muslim inmates; steps to 

effectively reintegrate former inmates into the larger society; development of a comprehensive strategy to counter radicalization, 

drawing upon the lessons that can be learned and adapted from 

other efforts to combat gangs and right-wing extremists in prisons; 

and the evaluation of existing prison programs from all levels of 

government and internationally designed to prevent radicalization 

and recruitment or to disrupt radical groups. Knowledge must be 

translated into action across the board. Awareness, education, and 

training programs must be developed for personnel who work in 

prison, probation, and parole settings. 

Finally, broader avenues of dialogue with the Muslim community 

should be identified and pursued to foster mutual respect and understanding and ultimately trust. To confine the discussion to 

issues of terrorism alone is bound to encourage a defensive posture 

and impede constructive dialogue. 

Prison radicalization is but one subset of the battle of ideas, and 

it is only by challenging ideas with ideas, both within and beyond 

prison walls, that hearts and minds may ultimately be changed 

and radical ideas moderated. 

Thank you, Madam Chairman, and I am sorry for going a couple 

seconds overtime. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you very much for excellent testimony. Dr. Saathoff. 

TESTIMONY OF GREGORY B. SAATHOFF, M.D.,1 EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, CRITICAL INCIDENT ANALYSIS GROUP, AND ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF RESEARCH, SCHOOL OF MEDICINE, 

UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA 

Dr. SAATHOFF. Chairman Collins, Senator Carper, and the staff 

members of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, I would like to thank you for inviting me to testify before you today on this subject of national importance. It has 

10

been a privilege to serve as Co-Chair with Mr. Cilluffo on the Prisoner Radicalization Task Force that has released its report today. 

Throughout the last decade, I have assisted in the coordination 

of briefings between behavioral science experts in the FBI and an 

international group of religion scholars associated with the American Academy of Religions. During the last 15 years, as a member 

of the faculty of the University of Virginia’s School of Medicine, I 

have provided consultation in more than 10 State prisons, Federal 

prisons, and jails. Through this work, I have had an opportunity 

to witness the importance of the media, the power of social networks, the changing role of information technology, and the often 

vital role that religion plays in rehabilitation, if not redemption. 

In my brief remarks today, I will speak to the issue of radicalization from a behavioral science perspective. 

While the Federal prison system has made great strides in addressing the issues of religious radicalization and recruitment within prisons, our level of awareness and understanding is still quite 

limited, particularly at the level of the State prisons, community 

corrections, and local jails. Research on the characteristics of terrorist recruits abroad has identified youth, unemployment, alienation, a need for a sense of self-importance, and a need to belong 

to a group as common factors, all of which are present among U.S. 

prison populations. 

The landscape of prison life has also changed dramatically in 

that the 24-hour news cycle available within prisons acts as a force 

multiplier. Now, why is this important? Behavior is contagious, 

whether it occurs in exuberant fans crowding onto a sports field 

after a victory or angry inmates who riot within a facility. 

I learned this myself when I was called to see an inmate who 

had set his cell on fire. It was only after I treated him that I realized that the image of a raging fire on television had provoked him 

to torch his cell. 

This can also occur on a macro level. Two days after the World 

Trade Center attack, I consulted to a prison that I thought I knew 

well. Anxious inmates informed me that the televised images of the 

September 11 attack were cause for celebration among many of the 

inmates. In fact, they estimated that perhaps a third of the inmates praised the attacks, and their cheers could be heard in cellblock after cellblock. I would like to emphasize that the cheering 

inmates shared not a single religion, but a vulnerability to 

radicalization. 

Of course, access to radio and television can have a significant 

positive impact within prisons. However, one of the byproducts of 

our smaller, more information-connected world is the globalization 

of grievance. Images of distant conflicts are burned into the memories and identities of impressionable inmates. Television transmissions of bombings and group violence have immense power, and 

their impact within the prison environment cannot be overstated. 

When there has been little exposure to organized religion in the 

community, the inmates’ understanding of religion is dependent 

upon the religious leadership and materials at their facilities, and 

this is complicated by the fact that the vast majority of inmates are 

located not in the Federal, but in the State prisons and local jails, 

1.7 million inmates in a diverse, dispersed system, or set of sysVerDate 0ct 09 2002 08:12 Aug 24, 2007 Jkt 030597 PO 00000 Frm 00014 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\DOCS\30597.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
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tems, actually. Radical rhetoric may therefore exploit the inmates’ 

vulnerabilities and lack of grounded religious knowledge by providing validation to the inmates’ disillusionment with society and 

by creating an outlet for their violent impulses. 

Psychological factors that increase vulnerability include a high 

level of distress, cultural disillusionment, lack of intrinsic religious 

beliefs or values, dysfunctional family systems, and dependent personality tendencies. Inmates may also be drawn to radical groups 

out of the need for protection or to gain status among other prisoners. 

Occasionally, I am asked to describe the typical radicalized inmate. While it seems a reasonable question, I would suggest that 

focusing only on individual inmates is not an appropriate solution. 

In fact, terrorism is a team sport. Social bonding is not only the 

magnet, but also the glue that holds these groups together, rather 

than concepts like brainwashing that are simple, attractive, and 

wrong. The most effective terrorists are team players who play different positions on a radicalized field. Our overcrowded prisons provide an opportunity for a deep bench. 

Even more importantly, para-radicalization and recruitment 

occur in prison. In this exploitative environment, inmates, visitors, 

and even prison employees can be unwitting players who can be cajoled, bribed, or coerced into transmitting messages and materials 

without being aware of their real purpose. 

It is not enough to understand terrorism in prison by learning 

only about inmates. One must also have an understanding of those 

who visit and volunteer in prisons. Studies have suggested that terrorist recruitment methods are not always expected to yield a high 

number of recruits. Even if the radical message resonates with only 

a few inmates, they could then be targeted for more intense oneon-one instruction. The impact and destructive potential of a prison-directed terrorist cell is enormous. 

There is a difference between a radicalized prisoner who holds 

radical religious or political beliefs and a prisoner who has been recruited by a terrorist group and who has chosen to commit violence. An important resource for combatting terrorism might be to 

determine which factor or factors influence some radicalized prisoners to make that specific leap from radical beliefs to violence in 

the name of those beliefs. 

Because radical religious violence can occur within prisons, we 

have an obligation to inmate populations, certainly, but also to 

those who are charged with maintaining safe prisons. Just as we 

seek to protect our soldiers by providing them with the most upto-date intelligence, we are also obligated to use our enhanced 

knowledge to safeguard the lives of our correctional officers. A compelling case can be made for a review of our prison system, particularly at the State and local levels. 

Chairman Collins, in order to defeat a networked opponent, our 

prisons need to be networked through information technology systems that are truly integrated. 

When serious symptoms present, it is tempting to try to reach for 

a treatment before we have a diagnosis. History reveals that government works best when it first shines light rather than heat 

upon concerns that involve religious questions and conflict. GovernVerDate 0ct 09 2002 08:12 Aug 24, 2007 Jkt 030597 PO 00000 Frm 00015 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\DOCS\30597.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
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ment must be proactive. We must base our operations on real intelligence rather than gut reactions. Unless we understand the nature 

and extent of the problem of religious radicalization in prison, we 

are likely to first neglect it and then overreact in a way that unnecessarily antagonizes and polarizes our prison population. 

In addition to being an assault on civil liberties, an aggressive 

overreaction by government in the absence of good intelligence 

would lose hearts and minds to radicalization and recruitment, 

playing into the very hands of those who would want to subvert our 

system. Our briefings revealed that while the New Folsum plot in 

California was discovered in the community accidentally by virtue 

of a dropped cell phone, the response of the Joint Terrorism Task 

Force in Los Angeles was superb. Expecting, though, that a Joint 

Terrorism Task Force should be a primary force for dealing with 

this complex problem is like expecting emergency rooms to provide 

all medical care. Proactive, integrated, intelligence-sharing systems 

are critical to identify and connect the dots before they become 

plots. 

In my role as a consulting psychiatrist to prisons, I also teach 

the medical students who accompany me. Prison can be a humbling 

place where teachers once again find themselves to be students. I 

will never forget one of the first religious challenges that faced me 

in prison. A suicidal inmate was to be placed in a stripped cell 

without any possessions. As he was led from my office, he begged 

me to allow him to keep just one possession, his Bible. At such a 

time, it appeared obvious to me that this request could easily be 

granted, and without hesitation, I instructed the officer to give him 

his Bible. Before doing so, though, the officer flipped through the 

pages, reached into the Book of Revelations, and pulled out a razor 

blade. ‘‘Doc,’’ he said, ‘‘do you want him to have this, too?’’ The inmate smiled weakly and said, ‘‘I guess I don’t need my Bible after 

all.’’

Unfortunately, we are living in more complex times. An officer 

who can easily identify and remove a razor blade from a Bible will 

most likely not be able to identify the razors of radicalization, such 

as jihadist material that advocates violent measures against innocent civilians, gangs who are willing to masquerade their violence 

as religion, and radicalized individuals who are willing to take the 

last step toward terrorism. 

In closing, I would like to recognize the Committee and staff for 

their professionalism and the School of Medicine at the University 

of Virginia and its resources within the Critical Incident Analysis 

Group. I would also especially like to thank Frank Cilluffo and the 

Homeland Security Policy Institute at the George Washington University for their dedication to this process, and, of course, the task 

force members. 

I would like to extend to you an open offer to continue to work 

closely with them, thank you, and I would be pleased to try to answer any questions you may have. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you, Doctor. We very much appreciate 

your testimony and your offer to continue to work with the Committee as we pursue this issue. 

Chairman COLLINS. Mr. Gartenstein-Ross. 

13

1The prepared statement of Mr. Gartenstein-Ross appears in the Appendix on page 57. 

TESTIMONY OF DAVEED GARTENSTEIN-ROSS,1 SENIOR CONSULTANT, THE GERARD GROUP INTERNATIONAL, AND COCHAIRMAN, THE COUNTERTERRORISM FOUNDATION 

Mr. GARTENSTEIN-ROSS. Chairman Collins and Senator Carper, 

thank you for inviting me to testify before you today. The Committee is to be commended for tackling an important issue like 

prison radicalization. 

In this testimony, I will provide an inside look at how access to 

the prison system can be used and exploited by an Islamic charity, 

radical in orientation, that is intent on fostering its vision for the 

faith. The core of this testimony is based on my time working for 

the Al Haramain Islamic Foundation, which was an international 

charity devoted to Wahhabism, the austere form of Islam that 

originated in what is now Saudi Arabia. While I now work in 

counterterrorism, I entered the field in an idiosyncratic manner. 

My introduction came as an employee of a radical Islamic charity 

that is now designated as a sponsor of terrorism by the Treasury 

Department. 

I grew up in Ashland, a small town in Southern Oregon. As my 

name suggests, both of my parents are from Jewish backgrounds, 

but they weren’t happy with traditional Judaism, so they encouraged me to find my own spiritual path. I found this spiritual path 

in college when I converted to Islam. My first job after college was 

with the U.S. headquarters of the Al Haramain Islamic Foundation, which happened to be located in my hometown. 

I worked for Al Haramain from December 1998 until August 

1999. I had a number of responsibilities during this time, but the 

most directly relevant one is that I was responsible for overseeing 

the charity’s prison dawa program, dawa being the Islamic form of 

evangelism. It was designed to educate U.S. prisoners in what Al 

Haramain considered to be true Islam. 

To cap off the story before getting to the specifics of the prison 

dawa program, I left the Islamic faith for Christianity prior to September 11, and by the time the FBI’s investigation of Al Haramain 

kicked into high gear in February 2004, I was ready to assist the 

Bureau in investigating the charity organization. I write about the 

experience in a forthcoming book coming out in February 2007 

called My Year Inside Radical Islam, copies of which have been 

provided to staff members of the Committee. 

At the outset, I would like to explore the Al Haramain Islamic 

Foundation’s connections to international terrorism in order to 

demonstrate the charity’s ideological orientation. The international 

Al Haramain organization was originally formed in Riyadh, Saudi 

Arabia, in 1992. At the time I worked for the group, it had offices 

in more than 50 countries and an annual budget of $40 to $50 million. Today, however, Al Haramain no longer exists as a separate 

entity. It was eventually merged, along with other charities, into 

the Saudi National Commission for Relief and Charity Work 

Abroad. 

Al Haramain’s terrorist connections begin with the branch that 

I worked for in Ashland, Oregon. It was designated as a terrorist 

sponsor by the Treasury Department. Two of the directors of this 

14

group were indicted for their roles in a complicated money laundering scheme that Federal investigators believe funded the 

mujahideen of Chechnya. 

Beyond the branch I worked for, Al Haramain had a number of 

other connections to international terror. The U.S. Treasury has 

designated Al Haramain offices in Kenya, Tanzania, and the 

Comoros Islands as sponsors of terrorism for their role in the 1998 

embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania. The Treasury alleges 

that the attacks were funded by a wealthy Al Haramain official, 

that a former Al Haramain director helped prepare the advance 

party that planned the bombings, and that these offices were used 

as a staging area and exfiltration route for the perpetrators. 

Al Haramain’s Indonesia office was also designated by Treasury. 

That office was reportedly a conduit for funds to Jemaah Islamiyah, the terrorist group responsible for the October 2002 Bali 

bombings, which killed 202 people, primarily foreign tourists. 

Other Al Haramain offices that were similarly designated by 

Treasury for connections to terror include the branches in Afghanistan, Albania, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, and Pakistan. 

Now, Al Haramain’s international terror connections provide a 

backdrop for understanding its prison dawa program, for understanding both the radical literature that the group distributed and 

also the potential for the program to be used in far more nefarious 

ways than it was actually used. I turn first to the group’s literature, which was undeniably radical. At the heart of any concerted Islamic literature program is distribution of the Qur’an. Al 

Haramain distributed a Wahhabi/Salafi version known as the 

Noble Qur’an that was translated into English by Muhammad 

Taqi-ud-Din Al-Hilali and Muhammad Muhsin Khan. This version 

was known for containing numerous bracketed interpolations that 

were not present in the original Arabic script of the Qur’an. Although ostensibly designed to explain the verses, these interpolations, in fact, pushed the meaning in a radical direction, one which 

was suffused with contempt for non-Muslims and one which openly 

advocated the global jihad. 

One example of this occurs in an early footnote in the translation, which states, ‘‘Al-Jihad (holy fighting) in Allah’s Cause (with 

full force of numbers and weaponry) is given the utmost importance in Islam and is one of its pillars. By Jihad, Islam is established, Allah’s word is made superior, and His Religion is propagated. By abandoning Jihad, Islam is destroyed and the Muslims 

fall into an inferior position; their honor is lost, their lands are stolen, their rule and authority vanish. Jihad is an obligatory duty in 

Islam on every Muslim, and he who tries to escape from this duty, 

or does not in his innermost heart wish to fulfill this duty, dies 

with one of the qualities of a hypocrite.’’

This passage thus rules out non-military interpretations of jihad 

by insisting that it occur with full force of numbers and weaponry, 

and it also endorses jihad as a means of propagating the Islamic 

faith, specifying that it is required of every Muslim. 

But most chilling in the translation of the Qur’an that Al 

Haramain distributed was a 22-page appendix. This appendix, 

written by former Saudi Arabian Chief Justice Abdullah bin Muhammad bin Humaid, was entitled ‘‘The Call to Jihad in the 

15

Qur’an.’’ The appendix was nothing less than an exhortation to violence. In it, bin Humaid argues at length that Muslims are obligated to wage war against non-Muslims who have not submitted to 

Islamic rule. He explains, ‘‘Allah commanded the Muslims to fight 

against all the Mushrikun as well as against the people of the 

Scriptures (Jews and Christians) if they do not embrace Islam, 

until they pay the jizyah (a tax levied on the non-Muslims who do 

not embrace Islam and are under the protection of an Islamic government) with willing submission and feel themselves subdued.’’ 

Mushrikun, referred to in this passage, is describing all non-believers who are not classified as the people of the scripture, i.e., those 

who are not Christians and Jews, and thus bin Humaid advocates 

war with the entire non-Muslim world. The appendix also appeals 

to the reader to join the jihad. 

Nor was the translation of the Qur’an the only piece of radical 

material that Al Haramain distributed to prisons. Another widely 

distributed volume was Muhammad bin Jamil Zino’s Islamic 

Guidelines for Individual and Social Reform. Like the translation 

of the Qur’an that Al Haramain distributed, one of the themes of 

Zino’s book was jihad. At one point, he instructs his readers that 

their children should be indoctrinated in the glories of jihad. 

Moreover, virulent anti-Semitism and hatred of non-Muslim governments were recurring themes in Al Haramain’s literature. On a 

page headed, ‘‘Act upon these Ahadith,’’ the hadith being the 

sayings and traditions that were attributed to Prophet Muhammed, 

Zino’s first injunction reads, ‘‘The last hour will not appear unless 

the Muslims fight the Jews and kill them.’’

More sweepingly, Zino denounces belief in manmade destructive 

ideologies, such as secularism, as nullifying an individual’s adherence to Islam. This is in keeping with the views of another writer 

whose works Al Haramain sent to prisons, Abu Ameenah Bilal 

Philips. In The Fundamentals of Tawheed, Philips describes 

acquiesence to non-Islamic rule as an act of idolatry and an act of 

disbelief. 

But beyond the literature, it is also important to understand the 

contours of the program that allowed this literature to reach the 

U.S. prison system. Prisoners would initiate contact with Al 

Haramain by writing to request Islamic literature. They might 

learn about us from their chaplains, through word of mouth, or 

through the name and address information that was stamped into 

the literature that Al Haramain distributed. Prisoners who wrote 

to Al Haramain would be sent a number of pamphlets and a questionnaire. The questionnaire asked a variety of informational questions, including inmates’ names, prisoner numbers, release dates, 

and address outside of prison. It also included questions designed 

to determine the inmate’s level of Islamic knowledge. 

It is what happened next with the questionnaires that caught investigators’ interest during their investigation of Al Haramain. 

After we graded the questionnaires, all of the information—including the inmates’ names, prisoner numbers, facilities they were held 

in, release dates, and the address they would be released to—was 

entered into a massive database containing 15,000 names. This 

database is significant because of the potential for terrorist recruitment. As the panel has already discussed, the prison population is 

16

1The posters referenced by Senator Collins appear in the Appendix on page 83. 

ripe for terrorist recruiting, and the database hosted by Al 

Haramain was perfectly designed to allow follow-up with prisoners 

and potentially to allow for terrorist recruitment. Al Haramain 

could have established ongoing relationships with prisoners, and 

the database contained the critical information that would have allowed Al Haramain or ideologically sympathetic organizations to 

follow up with prisoners after they were released and to point them 

in a direction that these organizations considered to be convenient. 

Ultimately, the program was not used in that way, but part of 

the reason may well have been that in a pre-September 11 world, 

it wasn’t seen as advantageous to recruit prisoners into terrorism 

out of the prison system because it was seen as more desirable to 

be able to raise funds and gain political influence in the United 

States. But now, in the post-September 11 world, the United States 

is undeniably seen as the focus of the global jihad. 

In closing, I would like to recognize the Committee and the staff 

for their professionalism and extend an open offer to continue to 

work closely with them. I am pleased to try to answer any questions that you may have. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you very much for your testimony. 

I would like to follow up on some of the points that you just 

made. You talked about the literature that was being sent in to 

prisons under your prison literature program, and you described it 

as undeniably radical. You read some excerpts from the Noble 

Qur’an, which certainly is the radical interpretation. But I understand that this publication, Islamic Guidelines, was also sent in by 

the charity, is that correct? 

Mr. GARTENSTEIN-ROSS. Yes, that is correct. 

Chairman COLLINS. I would like to have the board 1 put up so 

that I can read a couple of excerpts from this book, as well. There 

is a section on jihad as collective duty, and it says, ‘‘If someone 

makes any obstacle in the way of propagation, Muslims are allowed 

by Allah to fight them until Islam becomes the governing authority. Jihad in this sense will not stop until the day of judgment.’’ 

And then there is another quote that says, ‘‘The last hour will not 

appear unless the Muslims fight the Jews and kill them.’’ Obviously, a very extremist and radicalized version of Islam. 

My question to you is this. During any time that you were associated with sending this kind of extremist literature in the prison, 

was it ever refused by prison officials? Was it ever turned back or 

rejected that you are aware of? 

Mr. GARTENSTEIN-ROSS. No. During my time there, the literature 

was not once refused on the basis of its radical content. There were 

two instances I recall of literature being refused. Once, there was 

a prison chaplain who refused one of the pamphlets that we sent 

in. It was written in the typical vitriolic style of Al Haramain material, and it was a pamphlet discussing the Nation of Islam. But 

his concern was not so much the content itself as the potential for 

creating sectarian strife within the prison. 

The second instance of literature being refused was when a prison screener found that we had sent literature bundled in a manila 

envelope that had a metal clasp. He thought that the metal clasp 

17

might be used as a weapon by prisoners without any attention to 

the content of the material, which may well have been the deadlier 

weapon. 

Chairman COLLINS. This is an issue that I am going to raise with 

our next panel, but I want to follow up, Mr. Cilluffo, with your 

comment in which you talked about the need for more involvement 

by the Muslim community. It seems to me that this is an excellent 

example, where many prison officials, particularly at the State or 

even local level, are simply not going to have the resources or the 

expertise to do a review of the literature to see if it is appropriate. 

There is obviously also a difficult balancing test in that you don’t 

want to impede the flow of legitimate information about Islam into 

the prisons. 

Last week, we had a hearing in which we heard all of the witnesses who were asked to look ahead to the emerging threats over 

the next 5 years, and all of the witnesses told us that there needed 

to be more of an outreach to the Muslim community. You mentioned that in closing in your comments. Could you expand on how 

we might be able to better involve moderate Muslims in programs 

with prisons, including the review of literature? 

Mr. CILLUFFO. Absolutely, Madam Chairman, and that, to be 

honest, is the primary reason, or one of the primary reasons, we 

advocated the creation of a commission, since this cannot be won 

or defeated or tackled long-term by law enforcement means alone. 

That is only a small part of the solution. Rather, we need to bring 

people who actually have the knowledge and the wherewithal to be 

able to steer people in another direction and who have the capacity 

and the capability to know when things go awry. 

But I think if we look at it only through a counterterrorism perspective, that is automatically going to create defensive postures, 

understandably, that we need to actually expand those issues, and 

we quite honestly need more imams. We need more chaplains, I 

mean, at the Federal level. We only have 10 imams. In California, 

where we are talking about 300,000 people throughout the system, 

including paroles on the parolee side, we only have 20 imams. That 

is a tip. That is a very small percentage that can even handle the 

Muslim needs. 

So what I think we need to be able to do is expand the dialogue, 

but if we only look at it through this particular lens, and that in 

large part is where that dialogue is occurring, we are only going 

to get so far. So I think that we need to be able to put together 

an entity and a group that are going to look at it from multiple perspectives, from different denominations, as well, because ultimately 

it is going to require—this is a challenge that is within, to some 

extent, the Muslim faith, and they are going to be the most important component to any solution. 

One may argue, where is the Martin Luther King? Where is the 

Mahatma Gandhi? Maybe we need martyrs. But I think at the end 

of the day—for good, not only for terrorism. But at the end of the 

day, it is going to require bringing these communities in a trusted, 

honest way as part of an honest dialogue. 

Chairman COLLINS. Dr. Saathoff, could you help us better understand the circumstances under which radicalization lasts? What I 

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stand why the prison population is particularly ripe for radicalization efforts. After all, many prisoners are anti-social, angry at 

their government, looking to strike back, alienated, are seeking 

some sort of bond. But what causes the radicalization to last after 

an inmate is released from prison? I can understand why our prisons are fertile grounds, but once the inmate is released? 

Dr. SAATHOFF. Chairman Collins, this is a question that is on the 

minds of so many researchers who are interested in this issue. Certainly, there is such a dearth of research and literature on this 

issue of radicalization and particularly the issue of how radicalized 

individuals move to that next important step. And so I would say 

that we know very little except for the fact that networks and social bonds are very powerful. And so those kinds of social bonds 

that keep people in other types of organizations, religions, etc., are 

also important, from what we can understand, in terms of keeping 

people bonded within a certain community. And so as we look at 

not only the issue of prisons, but also rehabilitation and probation 

and parole, as Senator Carper was mentioning, these are issues 

that we would advise that a commission look at because the only 

way to loosen certain bonds is to find out how we can strengthen 

others. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. 

Mr. Gartenstein-Ross, the comments the physician has just made 

about networks leads me to a final question for you before I yield 

to my colleague, and that is the compilation by Al Haramain of this 

enormous database on 15,000 prisoners, information about their release dates and the address to which they were going to be released, what do you think was the organization’s purpose in compiling all that information? You made clear in your testimony that, 

as far as you know, it wasn’t used as a recruitment tool. Why 

would the organization, which is a sponsor of terrorism, go to the 

effort of maintaining such a detailed, comprehensive database on 

15,000 inmates? 

Mr. GARTENSTEIN-ROSS. Well, the information is dual-purpose. It 

is information that could be used either for legitimate purposes or 

for more nefarious purposes in terms of terrorist recruitment. 

In the case of legitimate purposes, the information can be used 

to make sure you don’t send the same literature to an inmate 

twice, to make sure that you don’t send literature to the inmate 

after the inmate has been released from prison, and also the address to which the inmate is released could allow for an ongoing 

relationship, but one that isn’t necessarily tied to recruitment to 

terrorism. 

In this case, Al Haramain, it seems to me, had a few factors 

working against it when using this for terrorist recruitment, one of 

which was that the head office in Riyadh, which held the purse 

strings, really didn’t have the idea of the kind of gold mine that 

it had in its hands. Rather than recruiting people out of prisons, 

they were much more intent on the social status that would be attained from recruiting rich white people into Islam and specifically 

instructed the head U.S. office that this is the kind of demographic 

that we should concentrate on. 

One other thing that I think is important is, as I said in my testimony, this was all the pre-September 11 world, where a lot of Al 

19

Haramain’s support for terror was focused on jihads in Chechnya, 

in Bosnia, in the Philippines, in Uzbekistan, and other far-flung 

places. Focusing on these various far-flung jihads and supporting 

them doesn’t necessarily translate into a real need to recruit inmates from the U.S. prison system for terror plots. And in fact, 

they may have thought that doing so would be counterproductive 

because we were able to operate very freely in the pre-September 

11 world. You saw the kind of literature that made its way into 

prisons, never once being questioned. If they were seen as trying 

to actively subvert the United States or do violence to it, that may 

have, in their view, somewhat undermined their cause. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. Senator Carper. 

Senator CARPER. Thanks, Madam Chairman. I just want to say, 

we have had a lot of witnesses come before us. These are three of 

the best. That is why I want to do this for a living. I thank you 

very much for coming and for your testimony and for your response 

to our questions. I see in the audience sitting behind the witnesses 

my friend Thurgood Marshall, Jr. Welcome. I can just barely see 

your lips move when he testified, so you have that down pretty 

good. [Laughter.] 

I want to go back to the issue of how few imams there are in 

these prisons. It is really striking. In our own prison system in 

Delaware, I am aware that there are a number of folks who come 

to our prisons on a fairly regular basis of different faiths. They do 

it in many cases on a volunteer basis, but they are there. 

I am Protestant. I think the Chairman is Catholic. In the New 

Testament, there is a verse which is actually pretty well known 

where we are exhorted, like when people are sick, we should visit 

them. When people are naked, we should clothe them. When they 

are hungry, we should feed them. When they are thirsty, we should 

give them a drink. And when they are sick and in prison, we 

should go visit them. A number of people in our faith take that seriously. Is there a similar kind of urging within the Qur’an to do 

that kind of thing? I presume that there is, but I just don’t know. 

We see it as sort of a Biblical injunction, what we should do as part 

of our faith, rather than just to talk a good game, but actually do 

it, and part of it is to visit people in prison. 

Mr. GARTENSTEIN-ROSS. Certainly within the Islamic faith, you 

can find a number of different injunctions that ask you to care for 

those who are less well off. There is a lot of ways, including 

Muhammad’s kind of elevation of the social status of slaves during 

that time and the like, that I think would give Muslims a similar 

sort of desire to help out within the prison system. 

One thing that has served as a barrier in the past is the certification process. For Federal prisons, there were only two organizations for a long time, both of which had at least some sort of 

Wahhabi or Salafi ties, that were allowed to certify Federal prison 

chaplains. Likewise, there often is not a situation where there is 

trust necessarily between members of the Muslim community and 

the prison system. But in the end, the fact that there are so few 

imams does indeed, as Mr. Cilluffo said, open the door for radicals 

to come forward when Muslim chaplains and Muslim imams who 

are more moderate in orientation aren’t really spearheading efforts 

to do so. 

20

Senator CARPER. Let me stay with this issue for just a moment. 

What should we be doing at the Federal level or State or local level 

to encourage folks of the Muslim faith to come forward, people who 

are not jihadists but mainstream? What can we do to encourage 

them, to make them feel welcome, if you will? 

Mr. CILLUFFO. Senator Carper, if I can expand because this is a 

differentiator between maybe the way the United States handles 

this issue and some of our allies overseas in Europe. I think if you 

look throughout Europe, and there are a number of phenomenal 

studies that have been done, perhaps the best one was actually 

done after the Van Gogh murder in the Netherlands, their intelligence service put together ‘‘Violent Jihad in the Netherlands: Current Trends and the Islamist Terrorist Threat.’’ I think the Europeans are looking at this from a top-down perspective. I think that 

the reason we are to some extent more inoculated from the crisis 

that they arguably are facing is because we need to look at it from 

the bottom up and from the top down. 

The bottom line here is that is that this is going to be as big of 

a role for a governor, for a mayor, and for county executives as it 

is going to be from the Federal perspective. And actually, the Federal Bureau of Prisons, in large part thanks to Congressional leadership in hearings held on the Judiciary Committee, did take some 

proactive actions after some hearings as well as an Inspector General’s report and have closed some of the holes in terms of some 

of the imams that were finding their way, and the Muslim chaplains, into the prison system. But it is not an issue of just making 

sure we are weeding out some of the more radicalist preachers but 

finding others to participate, and that is where relief organizations 

and the like are going to play a big role. 

But here again, you have that vetting challenge. Do you know 

who you know? To me, that is largely going to be part of a larger 

discussion that is going to have to occur at the community level, 

from the bottom up as well as from the top down, and ultimately 

information and intelligence and knowledge. So it is bringing all 

these pieces together. That is what is so difficult with this challenge; you can’t look at it only through a law enforcement or national security lens. That part is actually kind of easy, comparatively speaking. It is then looking to what we really mean by solution sets. 

Senator CARPER. All right. Thank you. 

Dr. Saathoff, I think it was you who mentioned information technology, and I think you said fully integrated. Would you just go 

back and tell us again what you were saying there? 

Dr. SAATHOFF. I was referring to the disparate information technology systems looking at inmates. There are some systems where 

visitors, for example, within a State at least are identified by name 

so it is possible to find out where visitors are going. There is no 

question but that visitation is really a crucial and very constructive 

element of prison rehabilitation, but there are some State systems 

that would not be able to tell you through data mining whether or 

not there are certain individuals who are just going to one prison 

and visiting family members, for example, or perhaps going to disparate prisons and visiting people that they don’t know. 

21

So looking at patterns, I think it is important for us to be able 

to just understand and shine a light, and because of the way information technology has advanced over time, what we have are different systems that don’t necessarily communicate. 

I would like to just add to Mr. Cilluffo’s statement with regard 

to your really vital question, and that has to do with welcoming 

and bringing in the constructive aspects that religion brings. I focused to some extent on how technology and information technology is a problem. The images that are seen in prison can certainly mobilize inmates in negative ways, but there are also ways 

in prisons, for example, that information technology is a real success. 

For example, we have inmates in the prisons that I work in who 

have very serious diseases, and because of the rarity of their disease, it may not be possible to bring a specialist, a top physician, 

to that prison to examine the patient. It may also be difficult for 

security reasons to transport the patient on a weekly basis. However, through telemedicine, we can bring top-quality professionals 

into the prison setting for very personal, direct contact. 

And so I think as we look at this confusing set of circumstances, 

just as information technology can be identified as a problem, ultimately, I think it really is going to be a solution in terms of really 

opening up more options for constructive, important interactions 

with regard to religion. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you. Madam Chairman, I just have a 

thought here. You mentioned the telemedicine and what a great 

use of technology that can be in the prison system. We have a situation where we don’t have very many imams who can come in and 

proselytize and deliver the sort of message, responsible message, 

that most of us would welcome. Has there been any use of the kind 

of technology that we are talking about in providing better medical 

care to allow mainstream imams to come in without physically 

being present in the prison but to be able to deliver a message that 

really reflects what is in the Qur’an? Is anybody doing that? 

Dr. SAATHOFF. Senator, I am not aware of that. 

Senator CARPER. Just take a moment and react to that idea. It 

may be a bad idea, but on Sunday mornings, you turn on the TV, 

and there are plenty of televangelists on the airways. There might 

be a good idea there. 

Mr. CILLUFFO. Senator Carper, I do think that is something 

worth exploring, and we did identify that to some extent as something a commission could look at, not specifically as it pertains to 

some of the telebroadcasts, but there really is no standard for what 

is acceptable and what is unacceptable material that is being disseminated throughout our systems. We know some literature that 

arguably does not reflect, and I would suggest doesn’t reflect, the 

Qur’an has found its way. So how do we build some of that capacity? I think information technology could be part of the solution. 

Senator CARPER. All right. Thanks very much. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. I want to thank this panel of 

witnesses very much. You have helped increase our understanding 

of the challenges that we face, and we look forward to continuing 

to work with you, so thank you for your participation. 

I would now like to call forth the witnesses on our second panel. 

22

1The prepared statement of Dr. Vanyur appears in the Appendix on page 66. 

Our first witness is Dr. John Vanyur. He is the Assistant Director of the Correctional Programs Division of the Federal Bureau of 

Prisons. He directs the security, intelligence, case management, 

mental health programs, religious services, community programs, 

and private prison management for the 113 correctional facilities 

and approximately 192,000 inmates nationwide. He has held a variety of positions during his 25-year career with the Department of 

Justice. 

Our second witness is Donald Van Duyn. He joined the FBI in 

August 2003 after 24 years of service in the CIA as an analyst and 

manager of analysts. He currently serves as the Deputy Assistant 

Director of the Counterterrorism Analysis Branch in the 

Counterterrorism Division. 

Our third witness, Javed Ali, serves as the Senior Intelligence 

Officer for the Chief of Intelligence in the Department of Homeland 

Security. Prior to joining DHS, he served as an intelligence officer 

with the Defense Intelligence Agency’s Joint Intelligence Task 

Force on Combatting Terrorism. 

We welcome all of you to the hearing today, and Dr. Vanyur, I 

would ask that you start. 

TESTIMONY OF JOHN M. VANYUR,1 ASSISTANT DIRECTOR, 

CORRECTIONAL PROGRAMS DIVISION, FEDERAL BUREAU 

OF PRISONS, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE 

Dr. VANYUR. Thank you. Chairman Collins and Members of the 

Committee, I am pleased to appear before you today to discuss the 

efforts of the Bureau of Prisons and what we are taking to ensure 

that we are preventing the recruitment of terrorists and extremists 

in our Federal prisons. 

The Bureau of Prisons is committed to providing inmates with 

the opportunity to practice their faith while at the same time ensuring that Federal prisoners are not radicalized or recruited for 

terrorist causes. We understand the importance of controlling and 

preventing the recruitment of inmates into terrorism. We know 

that inmates are particularly vulnerable to recruitment by terrorists and that we must guard against the spread of terrorism and 

extremist ideologies. 

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. We have taken a number of measures over the last several years, and we are actively engaged in several ongoing initiatives to ensure that Federal inmates are not recruited to support 

radical organizations or terrorist groups. We have eliminated most 

inmate organizations in order to control the influence that outside 

entities have on Federal inmates. We also have enhanced our information and monitoring systems, our intelligence gathering and 

sharing capabilities, and our identification and management of disruptive inmates. 

We have been managing inmates with ties to terrorism for over 

a decade by confining them in secure conditions and by monitoring 

their communications. We have established a strategy that focuses 

23

on the appropriate levels of containment and isolation to ensure 

that inmates with terrorist ties do not have the opportunity to 

radicalize or recruit other inmates. The most dangerous terrorists 

are confined under the most restrictive conditions allowed. 

We monitor and record telephonic communication involving inmates with terrorist ties, and we share any relevant information 

with the FBI, the National Joint Terrorism Task Force, and other 

agencies. In addition, our institutions work closely with the local 

joint terrorism task forces to share information and intelligence 

about these inmates. 

The Bureau of Prisons has two full-time employees assigned to 

the National Joint Terrorism Task Force to facilitate our involvement on this task force and to coordinate the exchange of intelligence related to corrections. These two members of the NJTTF 

also manage the Correctional Intelligence Initiative, a nationwide 

NJTTF special project involving correctional agencies at the Federal, State, and local levels designed to detect, deter, and disrupt 

the radicalization and recruitment of inmates. 

In addition to containing and isolating inmates who could attempt to radicalize other inmates, we help inmates become less vulnerable to any such attempts. Experts have identified the societal 

marginalization of inmates as the key factor in their becoming 

radicalized. The Bureau of Prisons provides inmates with a broad 

variety of programs that have proven to assist in the development 

of key skills, thereby minimizing the likelihood of the inmates 

being marginalized. 

Moreover, we are well aware of the important role religious programs can play in preparing inmates to successfully reintegrate 

into society. Religious programs and chaplaincy services are provided to the approximately 30 faiths represented within the Federal prison population. Full-time civil service chaplains in the Bureau of Prisons lead worship services and provide pastoral care and 

spiritual guidance to inmates, and they oversee the breadth of religious programs and monitor the accommodations provided by the 

contract spiritual leaders and community volunteers. 

We screen all of our civil service staff, volunteers, and contractors to avoid hiring or contracting with anyone who will pose a 

threat to institution security. Bureau of Prisons civil service chaplains must meet all of the requirements for employment as a Federal law enforcement officer. And like all Bureau of Prisons employees, chaplains are strictly prohibited from using their position 

to condone, support, or encourage violence or other inappropriate 

behavior. 

Our religious contractors and volunteers are also subject to a variety of security requirements prior to being granted access to our 

institutions, and we have and continue to work closely with the 

FBI and the National Joint Terrorism Task Force to improve our 

screening of contractors and volunteers. Information on staff chaplains, contractors, and volunteers is checked against databases supported by the FBI. We have also enhanced the supervision of programs and activities that take place in our chapels over the last 3 

years, and we have trained nearly all of our staff on recognizing 

the signs of potential radicalization. 

24

1The prepared statement of Mr. Van Duyn appears in the Appendix on page 74. 

Chairman Collins, this concludes my formal statement. I would 

be pleased to answer any questions you or other Members of the 

Committee may have. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. Mr. Van Duyn. 

TESTIMONY OF DONALD N. VAN DUYN,1 DEPUTY ASSISTANT 

DIRECTOR, COUNTERTERRORISM DIVISION, FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE 

Mr. VAN DUYN. Madam Chairman, Ranking Member, thank you 

for the opportunity to speak to you on the issue of prison 

radicalization in the United States. 

Before I begin, I would like to emphasize that Islam itself is not 

the problem, but rather how Islam is used by violent extremists to 

inspire and justify their actions. The FBI does not investigate individuals for their religious beliefs, but we investigate the activities 

of individuals who want to do harm to the citizens and interests 

of the United States and abroad. 

The FBI and the Bureau of Prisons analysis shows that 

radicalization and recruitment in U.S. prisons is still an ongoing 

concern. Prison radicalization occurs mostly through anti-U.S. sermons provided by contract, volunteer, and staff imams, radicalized 

inmates who gain religious influence, and extremist media. 

Ideologies that radicalized inmates appear most often to embrace 

include or are influenced by the Salafi form of Sunni Islam and an 

extremist view of Shiia Islam similar to that of the government of 

Iran and Lebanese Hezbollah. 

There are two groups of concern involved in prison radicalization 

and recruitment. The first group consists of inmates. These 

radicalized inmates either feel discriminated against in the United 

States or feel that the United States oppresses minorities and Muslims overseas. The feeling of perceived depression, combined frequently with their limited knowledge of Islam, especially for the 

converts, makes this a vulnerable population for extremists looking 

to radicalize and recruit. 

Radicalized inmates are of concern for a number of reasons. Influential inmates could urge other prisoners to attend certain 

mosques or Islamic centers in the United States or overseas upon 

their release that may present opportunities for the further proselytizing of radical Islam. Influential inmates could also pose a risk 

to prison security by urging inmates under their influence to disobey prison authorities and possibly incite violence within the facility. Inmates who have acquired skills used in terrorism activities 

could pass them on to other prisoners. 

The second group consists of contract, volunteer, and staff personnel, the majority of which are imams who enter correctional facilities with the intent to radicalize and recruit. Particularly for 

Muslim converts, but also for those born into Islam, an extremist 

imam can strongly influence individual belief systems by speaking 

from a position of authority on religious issues. Extremist imams 

have the potential to influence vulnerable followers at various locations of opportunity, can spot and assess individuals who respond 

25

to their messages, and could potentially guide them into increasingly extremist circles after release. 

Aside from individuals providing radical messages, there is also 

extremist media in the form of literature and videos being circulated within the prison population that appears to be a significant factor in prison radicalization. 

The majority of cases involving radicalization have not manifested themselves to date as a threat to national security. There 

have been, however, instances where charismatic elements within 

the prison have used the call of global jihad as a source of inspiration to recruit others for the purpose of conducting terrorist attacks 

in the United States. You referred to the JIS group in California, 

which is probably the most well-known case at this point in time, 

and that was certainly a wake-up call, I think in general, for both 

the FBI and the Bureau of Prisons in how we approach this problem, and I won’t go into further detail on that. 

The FBI and the Bureau of Prisons have been actively engaged 

in efforts to detect, deter, and disrupt efforts by extremist groups 

to radicalize and recruit in U.S. prisons since February 2003. These 

activities have been organized through the Correctional Intelligence Initiative, which you referred to earlier. I would like to 

stress that we have extended this initiative beyond just the Federal 

system, but into the State and local correctional facilities, and we 

realize the need to do that further. 

The CII program focuses first on improving intelligence collection, so that we truly understand the problem; detecting, deterring, 

and disrupting efforts by terrorist, extremist, or radical groups to 

radicalize or recruit in Federal, State, local, territorial, tribal, or 

privatized prisons; providing training and support materials that 

can be used by our field offices, JTTFs, and correctional institutions for training and outreach at State and local correctional institutions. 

All of these elements have helped to identify numerous factors 

responsible for the spread of radicalization and recruitment in prisons. A recent comprehensive assessment based on a survey of nearly 2,000 State and local correctional facilities identified the following trends. Most cases of prison radicalization and recruitment 

appear to be originated by domestic extremists with few or no foreign connections. Some radicalized Islamic inmates are current or 

former members of street or prison gangs, indicating an emerging 

crossover trend from gang member to Islamic extremist. Radicalization activity appears to be higher in high-population areas on 

the West Coast and the Northeastern United States. 

The FBI and Bureau of Prisons assessment identified best practices for correctional institutions to follow to combat the spread of 

radicalization and recruitment. Some of these are: Establish systemwide vetting protocols for all contractor and volunteer applicants; create systemwide databases of contractors and volunteers 

providing direct inmate services; improve monitoring capabilities; 

coordinate inmate transfers; share information among all levels of 

law enforcement and correctional personnel. 

Numerous FBI analytical products as well as operational highlights have been disseminated to our foreign liaison partners, from 

classified products to unclassified assessments for a wide audience. 

26

The feedback from these products has helped us to better drive our 

analytical and investigative perspectives and identify services 

where bilateral exchanges could prove beneficial on this issue. 

I would like to thank the Committee for the opportunity to address this important issue and look forward to answering your 

questions. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. 

Senator Carper, I know that you have to leave shortly. Do you 

have any questions you would like to pose? 

Senator CARPER. If I could. I apologize. The new President of 

Amtrak is waiting in my office to meet with me. It is a meeting 

we have sought, and I don’t want to keep him waiting. 

Could I ask the same question of each of you, if I may. What advice do you have specifically for us on this Committee and for us 

in the Senate on what we should be doing to address these concerns? 

Dr. VANYUR. Before I answer that, let me just mention, getting 

back to your suggestion on technology, this is a little lower tech 

than your suggestion, but what we did in the Bureau of Prisons is 

we had our imams, our civil service imams, videotape 125 jumma 

prayer sermons and over 70 Islamic study group sessions, and we 

distributed those throughout our system so that if we have inmateled groups, which I am sure we will probably get into a little bit 

later, they have a plug-and-play appropriate——

Senator CARPER. That is the kind of thing we do in our adult 

Sunday school classes in my church, and I am sure you are familiar 

with that in other faiths. Go ahead. 

Dr. VANYUR. I think the best thing is training, particularly pushing down training to the State and local levels, and so the appropriate resources for the development and the appropriate funding 

for the delivery of that training throughout all corrections—tribal, 

private, local, State, and Federal—to me would be the most effective strategy for this Committee. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you. 

Mr. VAN DUYN. I certainly concur with Dr. Vanyur’s assessment 

of the need for training and the greater awareness throughout the 

system so that people are aware of the problems that they are facing. And then in addition, I think to the degree to which we can 

integrate systems for vetting and information systems so that various institutions can talk to one another and exchange data easily 

would be the second thing that would be highest on my agenda. 

Senator CARPER. Good. Thank you. There is a national organization of State correctional secretaries or commissioners, and so they 

have a great forum to share that kind of stuff. 

Mr. Ali, I am sorry I am going to miss your testimony, but just 

give me one or two take-aways, if you will. 

Mr. ALI. Sure. Just to add to the comments that have already 

been made, I think two other important points that cross-cut various aspects of this radicalization issue, not just prison 

radicalization, outreach and dialogue with communities identified 

at potential risk of being exposed to these radical beliefs, whether 

in the prison system or not, I think that is certainly an effort that 

we need to further develop at the Federal level, and also continued 

dialogue at the State and local level to have contact with officials 

27

1The prepared statement of Mr. Ali appears in the Appendix on page 79. 

who are really seeing these experiences and activities on the 

ground. I know just from our DHS perspective, our understanding 

of just the prison radicalization issue has been incredibly enhanced 

by having direct interaction with State and local officials, and that 

is the perspective we just did not have at the national level. So 

those things from our perspective are very important. 

Senator CARPER. Our thanks to all of you, and I apologize for 

having to leave. Madam Chairman, thanks so much for giving me 

the opportunity to ask those questions. Thank you. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. Mr. Ali, you can proceed with 

your statement. 

TESTIMONY OF JAVED ALI,1 SENIOR INTELLIGENCE OFFICER, 

OFFICE OF INTELLIGENCE AND ANALYSIS, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY 

Mr. ALI. Thank you. Chairman Collins, Senator Carper, I know 

you are leaving, thank you for the opportunity to share perspectives from the Department of Homeland Security on the topic of 

prison radicalization. 

Since 2004, a spate of activities in Western Europe carried out 

or supported by radicalized homegrown Sunni extremists, including 

the March 2004 attacks in Madrid and the July 2005 attacks in 

London, have really focused national attention on the overseas phenomenon of radicalization or homegrown extremism. But more recently, developments here in the United States and Canada, including the disrupted JIS incident, which we have discussed and heard 

about here in California, but also the Toronto 17, those arrests in 

June, have also focused the same kind of attention on the phenomenon in North America. Against the backdrop of our larger efforts to understand radicalization here, activity occurring in some 

prison systems, such as last year’s JIS incident, has become of keen 

interest. 

In early 2006, the Department of Homeland Security Office of Intelligence and Analysis formed a team to develop a comprehensive 

intelligence-focused project that seeks to address how, why, and 

where radicalized ideas and beliefs develop over time in the United 

States. This project is part of a broader DHS approach in addressing the issue of radicalization and will help inform the Department-wide effort to understand and mitigate the phenomenon. 

We are conducting our study in a phased approach, focusing on 

examining radicalization dynamics in key geographic areas 

throughout the country. Our first phase focused on assessments in 

California and New York. Our second phase is focusing on the Midwest and the National Capital Region, and we hope to, beyond 

these first two phases, conduct other regional or State-specific assessments with the goal that all of these assessments will provide 

the building blocks for a larger national picture on radicalization. 

Thus far, we have found that the relationships between 

radicalization nodes and radical actor/groups vary across ideological and ethno-religious spectrums, different geographic regions, 

and socio-economic conditions throughout the country. Further, we 

have found several diverse pathways to radicalization in the United 

28

States through an examination of these nodes, and from our perspective, nodes are the conduits that facilitate and support the 

radicalization process, and they can be several things. They can be 

physical institutions, such as prisons; they can be virtual communities; they can be charismatic individuals; they can be written or 

recorded material, or even shared experiences or what we call a 

rite of passage. 

Further, we are also finding that radicalization in the United 

States is not a one-way street and that individuals and groups who 

can radicalize can just as easily deradicalize depending on a very 

complex set of factors. This particularly holds true when looking at 

the prison radicalization issue. 

Our research and discussions indicate that radicalization within 

prisons has occurred predominately, but not exclusively, among the 

African-American inmate population and those affiliated with 

gangs. Looking at that data set, inmates have been radicalized 

through charismatic, religiously radical inmates; by clerics, contractors, and volunteers who serve as religious authorities; and 

through extremist propaganda created both inside and outside of 

prison walls. 

As a result, from our perspective, there appear to be both bottom-up and top-down influences shaping the prison radicalization 

dynamic, although it is difficult to assign percentages as to which 

influence is greater. 

We judge that the current radicalization dynamics in some U.S. 

prison systems do not yet present the level of operational threat 

seen in other parts of the world. That said, last year’s incident with 

the JIS in California suggests that small motivated clusters of likeminded individuals exposed to radical beliefs within prisons could 

potentially cause harm once released. 

We have worked with partners at the Federal, State, and local 

levels to enhance our understanding on this issue of prison 

radicalization. At the Federal level, we have worked with the FBI 

and the Bureau of Prisons, amongst others, and at the State and 

local levels, as I indicated before, we have held discussions with officials in a variety of locations, to include New York, California, Illinois, and Ohio, regarding their particular unique perspectives on 

radicalization and will also soon hold similar meetings with representatives from Texas, Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, DC. 

In conclusion, our work on radicalization, including the examination of the extent and depth of the phenomenon within prisons in 

the United States, is preliminary and by no means complete. Continued dialogue and relationship building with Federal, State, local, 

and even foreign partners are critical aspects of this work. We hope 

our efforts on radicalization will help enhance the Department’s 

perspectives on this issue and help policy makers throughout the 

Federal Government make the most informed judgments about how 

best to address the phenomenon inside the United States. 

Madam Chairman, thank you again for giving me the opportunity to speak with you and Members of the Committee, and I 

welcome your questions. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you very much. 

Dr. Vanyur, you anticipated what my first question was going to 

be in your comment to Senator Carper. In your testimony, you 

29

talked about screening all of the civil service staff, volunteers, and 

contractors, that each Bureau of Prisons civil service chaplain has 

to meet certain requirements for employment, that there is a field 

investigation, a reference check, a panel interview. But we know 

that due to the shortage of imams going into our prisons, that a 

lot of Islamic groups within prisons are led by inmates. Is there a 

system for screening inmate-led religious discussions or services to 

ensure that the radicalized form of Islam is not being taught? I am 

told by law enforcement officials that there is even a nickname for 

it of Prislam, that it is that common. 

Dr. VANYUR. The answer is yes, and let me just mention, to look 

at the 11 civil service imams is really underestimating who is delivering Islamic services throughout the Federal system. There are 

also 56 contract imams that are not employees of ours, but are on 

a contractual pay basis, delivering Islamic services inside Federal 

prisons, and over 20 Islamic volunteers. 

But that said, there is a substantial portion of Islamic services 

being led by inmates. A lot of that has to do with where we have 

built prisons in many of the States and in the Federal system over 

the last 20 years. Many of them are in very rural and remote areas 

where there is just not a large Islamic population in that area. 

What we do with inmate-led groups is a few things. First, any 

inmate-led group has to have 100 percent constant staff supervision. So anytime there is an inmate-led group or an inmate-led 

study or jumaa prayer, there is a staff member in that room 100 

percent of the time. 

We require all of our religious services to be in English except 

for that part of the service that has some formulaic prayer. So in 

a jumaa service, you have got a piece of it that is a formulaic prayer, for lack of a better word, that needs to be in Arabic. But then 

the sermon or homily, we require that to be in English so that our 

staff member can understand what is going on. 

We require that the inmate-led groups rotate the inmate who is 

leading that group week to week so that we don’t have one individual who is dominating the group or trying to steer the group in 

a particular direction. 

We also ensure that we have standardized headgear and procedures for inmates. Years ago, we would let inmates have their own 

religious headgear, so they would use that as a sign of leadership, 

different color kufis and other religious headgear. Now we have 

standardized all that to take away any trappings of leadership or 

direction that an inmate can bring on. 

So we think with that really intense monitoring, the requirement 

of English, and then that piece I mentioned earlier where we provide a lot of videotapes and study guides that are the appropriate, 

accurate form of Islam, that we have very good control over the inmate-led groups. 

Chairman COLLINS. You heard on our previous panel the discussion that I had, and I am going to ask that the posterboards be put 

back up, that had some very disturbing radicalized quotes on an 

extremist version of Islam that was part of literature sent into prisons by the group Al Haramain, which was later designated as a 

sponsor of terrorism. This particular copy of this very disturbing 

book was ordered by my staff on amazon.com. It is a used version 

30

of it. If an inmate ordered this book today, would there be any review of it by prison officials or would it most likely get to that inmate? 

Dr. VANYUR. Every incoming publication is reviewed, but there 

is a different standard for the publications that we place in our 

chapels that we control, which is totally discretionary in what the 

Bureau of Prisons wants to place in that chapel, and what an inmate can get. And so the standard for an inmate is much lower, 

and the standard is generally if a publication presents a threat to 

institution security, deals with drug introductions, criminal activity, then we would reject the publication. 

It gets very difficult when you talk about what are sort of religious-political rhetoric in terms of whether that crosses the line of 

threatening institution security or being part of criminal activity. 

So I can’t comment specifically on that book, but it is a difficult 

issue, I think, on the publications because of the First Amendment 

rights that inmates still have. So my response, Senator, is that, 

yes, we would review the book, but I couldn’t tell you without further review whether we would reject it across the board or not. 

Chairman COLLINS. What standard is used to decide whether literature should get through to an inmate? 

Dr. VANYUR. Again, the standard is very clear in Federal regulation, if it is detrimental to the security, good order, or discipline of 

an institution or facilitates criminal activity, and that is the standard that is in Federal regulation that would cause us to reject a 

particular piece of correspondence or a publication. 

Chairman COLLINS. I guess I need to go to some of the specific 

language in this to understand whether this would meet that 

standard. As this chart shows, it says ‘‘the last hour will not appear unless Muslims fight the Jews and kill them.’’ The earlier 

posterboard said, ‘‘If someone makes any obstacle in the way of 

propagation, Muslims are allowed by Allah to fight them until 

Islam becomes the governing authority.’’ Is that kind of language 

sufficient to block this literature from reaching an inmate? 

Dr. VANYUR. I believe this last quote would be because you are 

talking about killing other individuals. 

Chairman COLLINS. Right. 

Dr. VANYUR. And we try to push out literature that disparages 

other religions, also, but these are difficult decisions to be made at 

the local level, and to be honest with you, the more difficult decisions are not in Islamic text. We have a lot of white supremacist 

literature and Christian identity movement and a number of other 

types of literature that come in that we are constantly making 

these decisions on. So I believe, particularly based on that last 

quote, we would reject that book. 

Chairman COLLINS. Do you involve experts, religious experts of 

all faiths, in reviewing literature related to a particular faith to decide what should come in and what shouldn’t? You have mentioned, 

and obviously I mentioned in my opening statement, some white 

supremacist groups that have very violent literature that could 

come in under the guise of religion. Do you involve clergy, mainstream clergy, from various faiths to help you do this kind of review? 

31

Dr. VANYUR. We do. We have over 200 civil service chaplains, 

and we designate some as subject matter experts for their particular religion that we use to review many of these materials. In 

the case particularly of Islam because our number of imams is so 

low, we have reached out to a number of universities and other Islamic study centers to try to assist in this. But I would agree with 

the three speakers in the last panel that the amount of outreach 

and contact can be greatly improved. 

Chairman COLLINS. It is my understanding that the Bureau of 

Prisons is doing an inventory of books in both chapel libraries and 

in the main libraries of prisons. Is that correct? 

Dr. VANYUR. That is correct. 

Chairman COLLINS. And that is ongoing? 

Dr. VANYUR. That is ongoing, and it is showing us some of the 

problems that we are going to confront because the number of entries so far in our database exceeds 20,000. So there is a lot of material that is out there. 

One of the changes we just recently made is we have for the first 

time taken specific publishers and any materials produced by those 

publishers, we have removed from any of our libraries and frozen, 

and that is different than the way we used to handle business, 

where it was on a text-by-text basis. The majority of those publishers, by the way, are not Islamic publishers. They are primarily 

white supremacist. So we have tried to take a broader approach in 

terms of materials coming in. 

We also work with our partners on what is coming in, and the 

Qur’an that was discussed earlier was a piece of literature that we 

received notification from the FBI had some issues, and we removed that particular version of the Noble Qur’an from all of our 

libraries. So it is a cooperative effort across our law enforcement 

and other corrections partners, also. 

Chairman COLLINS. When you find extremist literature like this, 

whether it is Islamic or Christian or any other kind of extremist 

literature, do you share that information with State and local correctional facilities? The Federal Government has the resources and 

the knowledge to do this kind of review. Probably a large State like 

California or New York does, as well. But smaller States simply 

don’t have the expertise or the resources. So do you maintain a list 

of extremist literature that can be shared with your State and local 

counterparts? 

Dr. VANYUR. We have not. We do a lot of sharing with the State 

and local counterparts, particularly through the National Institute 

of Corrections, which is a wing of the Bureau of Prisons that deals 

specifically with State and locals, but I don’t believe we have actually put on their website or put out to the States specific publications that we have eliminated. 

Chairman COLLINS. I think that would be something for you to 

look at. When I think of a State like mine, a small State with very 

limited resources with a population that has very few Muslims, for 

example, it would be extremely difficult, I think, for prison officials 

in my State to make that kind of assessment. But it would also be 

very helpful regardless of whether it is religious in nature or not 

for States like Maine to have a list of extremist literature to be on 

the lookout for. It also, I think, would give more comfort to State 

32

and local officials that they are making the right decision in what 

is admittedly a very difficult area because of concerns of protecting 

civil liberties and religious freedoms. So that is something I would 

encourage you to pursue. 

Dr. VANYUR. We will, Senator. I concur. 

Chairman COLLINS. Mr. Van Duyn, I want to turn to the JIS 

case out of California that I discussed in my opening statement. In 

the indictment, there is mention of a document or protocol that 

Kevin James clandestinely distributed, and this document apparently set forth his bizarre teachings about Islam including ‘‘justification for killing non-believers.’’ Do you know how he was able 

to distribute that document? 

Mr. VAN DUYN. I don’t have the specifics on just mechanically 

how it was done. My sense is he did up copies that he handed out. 

I know he gathered some of his materials from the Internet. That 

is where he got some of the ideas. Then he pulled it together. Some 

of the materials were hand-written, so he would have had to make 

copies and then basically pass them around. But I would have to 

check on the actual mechanics. 

Chairman COLLINS. Mr. Ali, do you happen to know how he was 

able to distribute that information? 

Mr. ALI. The description that Mr. Van Duyn made is fairly accurate, that some of this material was obtained through the open 

source, through Internet, through information that he brought into 

the prison system. Some of it was his own sort of musings or 

writings that he wrote down by hand and then he put together his 

own manual and then apparently just passed that out by hand. I 

don’t think it went out beyond the hard copy dissemination. 

When we were in California earlier this year, actually, in Sacramento, we sat through a presentation with prison officials, and 

they showed via PowerPoint slides certain pages of the manual 

that he had written, and it is fairly alarming stuff just from the 

sense of the ideas that were being shared within this small group 

of individuals, and there are other groups active just like that within the prison systems there. 

Chairman COLLINS. Mr. Van Duyn, do you know whether copies 

of these documents that Kevin James circulated were found in 

California prisons? 

Mr. VAN DUYN. Yes, they were. 

Chairman COLLINS. Do you know how many? 

Mr. VAN DUYN. I know the materials were found in his cell, and 

then some other materials were found in other places because I 

know after the arrest—that you refer to from the cell phone, it led 

them to the house, and some of the materials were found there, 

and then subsequently to him, but I don’t know the specifics of 

where they were all found. 

Chairman COLLINS. I know that the FBI led the investigation 

that eventually traced this cell phone back to the prison to the plot 

to Kevin James. Prior to what really was a lucky break of one of 

the perpetrators happening to drop a cell phone, was there any 

knowledge that you are aware of among the FBI or prison officials 

or State and local officials that such a plot had been hatched in 

prison? 

33

Mr. VAN DUYN. Before the incident of the arrest, the fact of the 

plot was not known. The group, however, was known. It was being 

treated mainly as a prison gang prior to the arrest for the robberies. It was on the discoveries emanating from the arrest after 

the robberies that then led people to the plot. That was the first 

knowledge of the plot per se. 

Chairman COLLINS. I guess that worries me because here you 

have a group of inmates led by a charismatic leader apparently 

who was able to propagate his perverted version of Islam and incite 

inmates to violence once they were released, and yet it seems to 

have been under the radar, something that was not detected. What 

do you think prison officials could have done to be more aware of 

what was essentially homegrown terrorists in their midst? 

Mr. VAN DUYN. I think many of the measures that Dr. Vanyur 

already discussed in terms of better monitoring of meetings, of activities, of literature, material that were there. In particular, I 

think monitoring of meetings so that there are not meetings that 

are being held without officials present. I think, just in general, 

better monitoring and better intelligence gathering in general inside the prisons, and I think the case of the JIS, I mean, really 

pointed that up, and also because that was a State prison, it also 

raises the issue of we need to have very good communications between all levels in the correctional systems. 

Chairman COLLINS. Mr. Ali, I note that you indicated that DHS 

is in the initial stages of its work on the radicalization issue. In 

your testimony, you referred to nodes where radicalization could 

take place, of which prisons are one. Do you have yet any sense of 

how significant a node prisons are for radicalization versus radical 

mosques or Internet chat sites, etc., or do you not have enough information yet? 

Mr. ALI. Madam Chairman, that is a great question. We are trying to get to that through this research, and by doing it with the 

regional approach of looking at States or different regions, we are 

trying to drill down to two or three levels below the national level 

perspective to get that more enhanced perspective. So you can 

make an argument that if you looked at what is going on in California right now, potentially within just California specifically, 

prisons and some of the activity within some of the prisons there 

seems to be of more concern or greater interest—or there is more 

activity in that particular node than potentially prisons in Illinois, 

where other nodes may have a greater impact. So that is the comparative look we are trying to develop. 

At a broad macro level throughout the country, though, I think 

we could say, at least from our initial perspective, that prisons 

don’t seem to have the same level of concern that we have from 

DHS that other nodes have in terms of a conduit in which radical 

ideas are either developed or passed or shared, not to say that they 

are not of concern, but in terms of a priority scale at a national 

level, they seem to be a little bit lower down. But certainly we are 

focusing attention on them. 

Chairman COLLINS. That is something that I think we need to 

get a better understanding of, is how radicalization and recruitment occurs not only in prisons, but elsewhere in our society. If you 

look at the attempted terrorist or actual terrorist attacks that have 

34

occurred worldwide since September 11, you see that more and 

more, they are being done by homegrown terrorists. All of the border security in the world is not going to help to address the problem of radicalization within our borders. That is why we have undertaken this investigation, starting with looking at prisons where, 

at the risk of using a bad pun, you do have a captive audience for 

radicalization and you have a population that has a propensity to 

violence and alienation already. 

So my hope is that we can continue to work with you, but I 

would also encourage you to work with your State and local counterparts. Frankly, I think the Federal Government is starting to 

move on this issue, has a good understanding of it, and is expanding its expertise with each passing day. But I am really worried 

about our State prisons, which is, after all, where most inmates are 

incarcerated. It is overwhelmingly at the State level. I worry that 

States lack the kinds of programs that you have talked about, the 

ability to screen individuals or literature, and the intelligence sharing of information that is just vital to addressing this problem. 

So I salute you all for the good work that you are doing, but I 

really encourage you to reach out to the Muslim community for 

help and to also reach out to your State and local counterparts so 

that we can share information about specific individuals, about 

radical literature, whether Islamic or otherwise, and about the 

techniques, such as the monitoring of religious services, that you 

have found to be valuable at the Federal level. I really think we 

need to have a major outreach effort in this area. 

I hope you will continue to keep in touch with the Committee 

and to work closely with us as you pursue your investigations and 

work in this area, and I want to thank you all for sharing your 

knowledge and expertise and insights with the Committee today. 

I want to again stress that our concern is not with inmates converting to Islam. In many cases, that can be exactly what a prisoner needed to put his or her life back on the right path, to shun 

violence and future criminal activity. What I am talking about is 

the extremist conversion, the radicalization of Islam that is adopted by some inmates, and in some cases, without any knowledge of 

prison authorities that this is going on. Obviously, we have seen 

that prisons for decades have been fertile grounds for radicalization 

in other areas and for the creation of gangs. So this is a further 

evolution of that trend, but indeed one that raises a great deal of 

concern about the potential threat to our homeland security. 

Again, thank you all for working with us, and we will be continuing to investigate this area. 

The hearing record will remain open for 15 days for the submission of any additional questions. I know many of my colleagues 

were tied up at other hearings today. That doesn’t reflect a lack of 

interest in the subject, and I think you can probably expect both 

panels will receive some additional questions for the record. 

Thank you very much for your participation. I also want to thank 

the members of my staff, particularly Jen Boone and David Porter, 

who have worked hard on this issue. 

The Committee hearing is now adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 11:56 a.m., the Committee was adjourned.] 

(35)

A P P E N D I X 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF SENATOR LIEBERMAN 

Thanks, Madam Chairman, and thank you for holding this hearing on a subject 

of growing interest and importance to our war against terror here at home. The idea 

of homegrown terrorism—terrorism that is born not deep in the Hindu Kush or in 

a desert cave but right here among us—is a frightening concept to most Americans. 

It eliminates the buffer of oceans and continents and even tightened immigration 

controls that have kept our neighborhoods and institutions relatively free of terrorist ideology. Home grown terrorism is now a grave enough concern that we must 

consider whether to focus more attention and resources toward it. I hope this hearing helps us to sort that out. 

Experience tells us that we need to consider and then work together to prevent 

the next terrorist attack, not the last one. Since September 11, we’ve spent billions 

of dollars to improve airline security and prevent terrorists and their tools of destruction from entering the country and we need to do more. But we must also be 

on the lookout for ruthlessness we have not yet experienced—terrorism spawned 

right here among us. 

The men who plotted and carried out last year’s bombings of the London Underground, for example, were converted to terrorist ideology in their home country, the 

United Kingdom—just as the perpetrators of deadly rail explosions in Madrid and 

Mumbai might have been homegrown. 

We will hear from our witnesses this morning of the developing concern that 

American prisons are potential breeding grounds for terrorism in this country. I 

say—potential—because there is no evidence to suggest U.S. prisons are churning 

out terrorists—yet. But nor can we afford to wait until production is in full swing 

before we address the conditions that could lead to that occurring. The missed opportunities leading up to the 9-11 attacks have been chronicled at length. So, again, 

I thank the Chairman for holding this hearing today so we can hear about a potential problem that can no longer be ignored. 

The study we will hear about today shows that the American prison systems—

Federal, State, and local—are environments that are permissive to the proliferation 

of radical ideologies. That permissiveness, quite naturally, is exploited by those 

wishing to fill out their ranks and win new recruits to the cause. The study’s authors—Mr. Cilluffo and Dr. Saathoff, together with their formidable team of experts 

from across the professional spectrum—have done outstanding work to identify potential loopholes that could be exploited by radical groups and to provide thoughtful, 

well-reasoned ways to close some of those loopholes. Our final witness on the first 

panel is someone who actually did exploit those loopholes. Mr. Gartenstein-Ross 

joined Al Haramain, a radical organization with terrorist ties. He was personally 

responsible for outreach to the prison populations in the United States and sent 

thousands of pieces of radical literature to prisoners. And although Al Haramain 

has been shut down, in large part due to Mr. Gartenstein-Ross’s cooperation with 

the FBI, there could be other similar groups still operating out there. 

The fundamental questions we must ask are what would cause a person to convert to a radical ideology condoning terrorism? What is the process by which a prisoner might convert to such an ideology? What are the conditions under which a conversion might take place? And what controls can we put into place to curtail such 

conversions? Dr. Saathoff, with his extensive experience in psychiatric evaluations 

of prisoners, will offer a glimpse into the behavioral science behind radicalization, 

and what factors might make the prison environment conducive to the recruitment 

of terrorists. And Mr. Cilluffo, who has lent his tremendous expertise in Homeland 

Security policy to this study, will offer insights on how the government, across levels 

and jurisdictions, can begin to close gaps in the system. 

The value of spirituality for inmates requires that a range of religious services 

be available. Our adherence to the principle of freedom of worship, in fact, allows 

36

for any inmate to request services in the religion of his or her choice. And since 

Islam is the second most widespread religion in the world, it is understandable and 

proper that it be represented proportionately among the chaplains employed by the 

prison system and among those who contract or volunteer to provide religious services to inmates. 

Unfortunately, the number of qualified Islamic chaplains, or Imams, is insufficient. Although over 80 percent of religious conversions in prison are to some form 

of Islam, only ten of the 200 chaplains in the Federal system are devoted to Islam. 

This staggeringly disproportionate number cannot possibly fulfill the need for expertise in cultural traditions and linguistics—not to mention offering a meaningful 

presence—in a system with a total population of nearly 200,000. The report states 

that radical prison groups have been able to use Arabic as a code for passing secret 

information. A greater corps of educated and certified Muslim chaplains and expert 

staff, with the ability to detect dangerous materials, teachings, and communications, 

seems key to controlling radicalization. 

As we will hear, radical Islamic literature may contain incendiary language 

against Jews, Christians, and others who are considered non-believers. Does that 

mean that extreme views, whether religious or political, naturally imply a proclivity 

toward violence? I don’t think so. There are no restrictions on thought in this nation. Freedom of ideas, freedom of expression, and freedom of religion are among 

the most cherished birthrights of our democracy. The First Amendment does not 

stop at the prison wall. 

But controls must exist to prevent the freedom of individual thought from devolving into a hateful ideology that promotes or incites violence. While it may be legal 

to hold such beliefs, it is decidedly illegal to act on them. Within the confines of correctional facilities, where a higher requirement for order exists, the interest of safety and security demands that these beliefs be discouraged. 

I hope that our second panel of witnesses can tell us today what controls are currently in effect in Federal prisons to stem the spread of hateful ideology and what 

additional controls should be instituted to halt recruitment and stop the 

radicalization process before it is manifested in terrorism. I also hope that this 

panel will speak to Federal efforts and plans to increase information sharing—a 

critical element in controlling the spread of radical ideology. The task force report 

starkly describes the challenges to sharing information between institutions, jurisdictions, levels of governments, and agencies in the correctional system. Dangerous 

religious service providers may move freely between jurisdictions, radical and charismatic inmates may be transferred untracked between prisons, and intelligence 

gained at the Federal level lacks a sufficient means for dissemination to State and 

local levels. The State of California has taken admirable strides in forming its Prison Radicalization Working Group, which draws together officials from all levels of 

government in monthly dialogues to address the problem. I hope similar efforts take 

root across the nation, with Federal leadership to assist in the sharing of information that is so essential in improving homeland security. 

I thank both panels of witnesses for taking the time to share their wisdom and 

experience today and I look forward to their testimony. The topic is an important 

one: Our dialogue today, and even more importantly, the dialogues that I hope will 

ensue, can only serve to increase our awareness and active vigilance against an 

ever-changing enemy in the war on terror.

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