[URBAN NOTE] "Toronto 18 plotter reflects on a decade in prison"

[rfmcdonald]

The Toronto Star's Michelle Shephard reports on one of the Toronto 18, who apparently has no access to any programs for terrorists on account of the lack of said. This is a problem, at least in a prison system based on rehabilitation.

Fahim Ahmad enters the room wearing his prison whites, glasses perched midway down his nose. He just left the kitchen, where he was making grilled cheese sandwiches for the lunch service.

Ahmad no longer looks like the 21-year-old who made headlines a decade ago as one of the leaders of the Toronto 18 terror plot. He’s bulkier, lost all his hair. He shows me his photo ID, taken during his first years spent at Quebec’s Special Handling Unit, which has the reputation as Canada’s toughest prison. “See, I had hair there. After the SHU, no hair.”

During his 2010 trial, the Crown described Ahmad as a “time bomb waiting to go off,” ranting about storming Parliament, taking politicians hostage and attacking nuclear stations. But he was also called a “fantasist,” whose big mouth was his only weapon of mass destruction.

Ahmad surprised with a guilty plea in May 2010 — nearly four years after his arrest and midway through his trial. Convicted of three terrorism charges, he was given a 16-year sentence and two-for-one credit for time spent in custody. At his sentencing hearing, the judge said he believed Ahmad had a good chance at rehabilitation.

But Ahmad has never participated in programs for inmates convicted of terrorism offences — because there are none.