Judge Leonie M. Brinkema, who presided over al-Timimi’s 2005 trial in federal court in Alexandria, ruled last month that al-Timimi could be released after a 14-day quarantine because he has a strong chance of seeing his sentence shortened on appeal and a high risk of complications if infected by the novel coronavirus.
“There are exceptional reasons why his continued detention is not appropriate,” she wrote. “He may well have already served excess years in prison.”
His only disciplinary infraction, she noted, was a 2018 incident in which he told a guard that if he was threatened by another inmate again he would beat the man up. Al-Timimi was fined $20.
Defense attorney Jonathan Turley confirmed that he picked up al-Timimi at a maximum-security prison in Colorado and drove him to Virginia on Tuesday but declined to comment further.
A biologist and prominent lecturer at a Falls Church mosque, al-Timimi told a small group of his followers after the 9/11 attacks that it was time to join the fight overseas, including against U.S. troops in Afghanistan. Members of the group took his words to heart, training by playing paintball in the woods of Virginia. Some went so far as to train at a camp in Pakistan run by a group later designated as a terrorist organization. But none actually went to Afghanistan and fought against U.S. troops.
The use of weapons at that camp led to steep prison sentences for three defendants who went to trial, including al-Timimi. The other two were released early because of court decisions finding the law’s definition of a “crime of violence” too vague, a position upheld last year by the Supreme Court.
Brinkema found that al-Timimi was likely to see his sentence similarly cut by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit. The cleric has also challenged his convictions as violating his free speech rights and maintains that the government failed to hand over evidence that another man in his orbit, Anwar al-Awlaki, was working as an informant for the United States. Al-Awlaki later became a top al-Qaeda strategist and was killed in a drone strike in 2011.
Prosecutors have said al-Timimi had no right to know at the time of the trial whether al-Awlaki was working with U.S. law enforcement. The Justice Department fought unsuccessfully for al-Timimi to remain behind bars, arguing there is “zero evidence” that he has reformed since committing “profoundly serious” crimes.
“The defendant sent his acolytes overseas to garner firearms and explosives training so that they could wage violent jihad against American soldiers in Afghanistan,” prosecutors wrote.