Some people are concerned that transferring terrorists from GITMO to prisons in the US is a security risk because of the possibility of escape. Terrorists have attempted to escape from prison before.
Just this month, extra security precautions were taken at an English prison, HMP Full Sutton, in East Yorkshire after discovery of an escape attempt by terrorists similar to another escape attempt last month by nine inmates including convicted terrorists who planned to escape by helicopter.
The two plots to escape from an English prison were prevented. There are very few escapes from prisons and the possibility of terrorists escaping from a US prison is probably not really a concern.
The biggest threat to transferring GITMO detainees to US prisons is the probability that the terrorists will convert even a few prisoners to agree with their radical beliefs. Prison is a small enclosed community with a captive audience of prisoners many of whom are uneducated, emotionally disturbed, grew up in a broken family and looking for a group to belong to which will accept them.
Undoubtedly, each terrorist released into a prison population will find a couple of prisoners to prey on. When those prisoners are released, they can become just as dangerous. Just today, four homegrown terrorists were arrested in Riverdale New York. The ringleader James Cromitie who was raised as an Episcopalian spent 12 years in state prison and listed his religion as Baptist when he was first jailed and then listed his religion as Muslim. No information was released as to who indoctrinated him while in prison, but he grew up in a large broken family and his sister described him as “…the dumbest person I ever came in contact with in my life”.
Prisoners with this type of profile can easily be targeted and converted by terrorists to continue their work after being legally released.
Richard Reid a.k.a. Abdel Raheem and Tariq Raja, who attempted to ignite explosives in his shoes and blow up an American Airlines plane at Christmas 2001, became a radical Islamist while incarcerated in a UK prison.
Jose Padilla, arrested in 2002 for planning to explode a dirty bomb is a former Chicago, IL street gang member who also became a radical Islamist while in prison.
The biggest threat is spreading terrorism to other prisoners who will be legally released.
