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Little Rock Shooter Says He’s with Al-Qaeda in Yemen

Abdul Hakim Muhammad's reversal highlights the threat from al-Qaeda in Yemen, and should draw attention to "prison jihad."

by
Annie Jacobsen

Bio

January 24, 2010 - 12:00 am
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On June 1, 2009, a Tennessee man born Carlos Bledsoe — but who changed his name to Abdul Hakim Muhammad — walked up to a military recruiting center in Little Rock, Arkansas, and opened fire. He killed a 23-year-old private named William Long and wounded another man, Private Quinton Ezeagwula, who was eighteen. At the time of the shooting, Muhammad was under investigation by the Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) for having traveled to Yemen, where he spent time in prison.

According to police reports, after the shooting Muhammad waved his Miranda rights, and on video “stated that he was a practicing Muslim … [and] that he was mad at the U.S. military because of what they had done to Muslims in the past.” According to a detective on the case, Tommy Hudson, Muhammad said that he had “fired several rounds at the soldiers with the intent of killing them.”

He pleaded not guilty.

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Last week, on January 12, this same man sat down and wrote a letter to the judge presiding over his capital murder case. Abdul Hakim Muhammad asked that the judge change his plea to guilty. In the letter, Muhammad says he was trained in Yemen by al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the same group believed to have trained Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who tried to blow up an airplane on Christmas Day.

Abdul Hakim Muhammad told the judge:

My lawyer has no defense. … I wasn’t insane or post-traumatic nor was I forced to do this act. Which I believe and it is justified according to Islamic laws and the Islamic religion jihad — to fight those who wage war on Islam and Muslims.

Muhammad’s father, Melvin Bledsoe, told the New York Times that he does not believe his son has ties to al-Qaeda. This despite the fact that in the fall of 2007, his son went to Yemen, where he lived for 16 months. He married a woman from Yemen and was imprisoned for using a false passport. Sometime after his release from the Yemeni prison he returned to America, where the JTTF picked up his trail.

In his interview with the Times, Melvin Beldsoe “suggested that [his son] might be trying to link himself to al-Qaeda because he believes it will lead to his execution and make him a martyr.” Bledsoe said he considers his son “unable to process” reality and that he has been “brainwashed.”

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22 Comments, 22 Threads

  1. 1. wake-up call

    Why wouldn’t Congress drag its feet? There are some on the far-left – both in and out of Congress – who actually want some sort of organized blood shed here, be it through a race war, a religious war – or both. It’s all part of targeting the status quo and shredding American values; they want to take us down, while instituting their brand of utopianism. To do it, they’re currently attempting a “soft revolution,” using Alinsky-style radicalism, through our Glorious Leader, Barak Obama.

  2. 2. Pragmatist

    Of course the PC,MC, left wing, Islamophile moonbats wont believe that it was all in the name of ISLAM no matter how many times they are told it is and how many Mohammedans ADMIT it and no matter how many people die. Oh no Left wing Liberal Moonbats know best . If they weren’t so dangerous to Western Civilization they would be a joke.

  3. 3. pelaut

    “One wonders why . . .”
    Really? Ask a teacher.
    Teachers have all peddled self-esteem, PC and multi-culturalism instead of the three R’s, and they denigrated American civics for the last three generations.
    No wonder at all.

  4. 4. Terry Gain

    Or is Congress in CYA mode?

    Wrong question. The better question is whether America is brain- dead-politically correct, like the President, Congress, academia, the media , Hollywood and most of the Brooksian “elite”

  5. 5. Joe B

    When is Congress not in CYA mode?

  6. 6. Morton Doodslag

    That darkened Klingon forehead scab seems to be an indicator of something… Hmmm…

    It’s bizarre. Zawahiri has one. Pantybomber has one. Al Qaeda in Arkansas has one… Al Qaeda at Fort Hood has one… What could this all mean?

    I’m beginning to suspect that there’s a relationship between those who pervert a Great World Religion, those who pound their foreheads in prayer, and those who twist a Religion of Peace by dherry picking from the violent terrorist or genocidal passages inne of those old holy books — somehow.. this might all somehow have something to do with terrorism… Still I’m not sure…

    Will need to study this issue really really hard, maybe have more consultations with all those superb and excellent experts on terrorism who’ve been guiding us so splendidly in the West since 9/11.

    Note to self: Somehow I must figure out the link between mosques, Imams, guys who pray by banging their forehead on the floor, quote from a Moslem Holy Book, and are then inclined to mass murder people they oddly call “infidels”… I feel I’m onto something big… VERY big…

  7. Morton Doodslang,

    Here’s your link:

    http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/Pages/Dhimwits.htm

  8. 8. Sallie

    There should be no clerics in any US prison, period~~

    There should be no freedoms in any US prison for anything, yes, this includes religion….. The ACLU needs to go to hell and take the Muslim radicals .with them..

    I don’t think most Americans are brain dead, I personally…don’t know what to do…I’m one person..no one in Washington will listen to me..maybe it’s how many feel..I’m not into headbanging, prayer rugs, revolutions, murder..

  9. #6

    I think that you are jumping to conclusions.
    And that could make our GREAT LEADER AND LIGHT OF THE PROLETARIAN REVOLUTION , and all his administration of commies, really unhappy.
    There is no connection whatsoever between islam and terrorism. None.
    Don’t jump to conclusions.

    Facts and numbers at

    http://www.thereligionofpeace.com

  10. #8 Sallie

    YOU WRITE:
    I personally…don’t know what to do…I’m one person..no one in Washington will listen to me..

    See this page

    http://www.actforamerica.org

  11. 11. Judy, NYC

    the very recent reversal allowing visa entry to a moslem “professor” who was kept out for his provoking and inciting jihad…not to mention all the effing moslems they let in to murder us, will give much aid and comfort to our enemies.

    barry, ask what you can do for your country. resign.

  12. 12. TomF

    His son has been “brainwashed”. No joke, that’s the whole point. We are not just in a war of explosives and blood. We are in an ideological war. Presently, we are loosing (thanks to our PC MSM). But thanks to people like honest Abdul, we may have a chance to turn the tide and wake up.

  13. 13. Ed Butt

    Its a mistake to over-react to this kind of thing. All the terror threats are vastly overstated by government. Their policy of spreading fear and panic is aimed at spreading surveillance. By creaing a climate of fear and insecurity they think we will consent to our freedoms being curtailed and our privacy invaded.

  14. 14. blotto

    Butt@13: You are kidding right? If it weren’t for 9-11, Cole, embassies, Ft. Hood, etc, etc, there might be a shred of truth to your comment. But in light of those FACTS, there is no such thing as over-reacting to anything said or done in the name of Islam by these low-level, Seventhy century nut jobs.

    Blah, blah about freedoms being curtailed. That hogwash was thrown against Pres. (a real president) Bush and it didn’t stick. But you can begin to cite the many freedoms the WON has begun to curtail….

  15. 15. gracie

    blotto..14

    you are 100% correct!

    Also, to avoid making martyrs of these people..put them in a hole, and let them all know that this is what will happen. let them rot for years with no contact. no rights for these muslims. none,nada,zilch!!!

  16. 16. Charles Stevens

    Islam and terrorists…
    Of all Muslims, ten percent do the actual dirty work, and the rest insist it’s not their problem.

    Now tell me again why Islam itself is not the problem?

  17. 17. KEYBOARD555

    BUTT@13—-Are you serious. We don’t have to live in fear and panic, but we have to realize these MUSLIMS are out to kill as many Americans as they can.
    As far as our freedoms being curtailed, OBAMA is doing a better job doing this, than the terrorist.
    Just look who he surrends himself with.
    Acorn, SEIU, BLACK PANTHERS, BLACK MUSLIM NATION, CODE PINK, BILL AYERS, on and on.
    HE takes over banks, car companies, housing, etc. etc.
    This gov. will take your property. for a shopping mall, or any other reason.
    This adm. is filled with , socialist, marxist,commies, child molestors, tax cheats, Chicago Thugs, Mao lovers, etc, etc.
    We have to be on the alert from outside terrorism and from our own inside terrorism.
    All great nations, since the beginning of time, have fallen from inside , because of corrupt leadership.

  18. 18. deguello

    Hey,I think we just found Obama’s next nominee to head the transit security agency!Seriously,this is going to get worse;the Jihaddists are finding low tech,yet effective ways to hit back at the Armed Forces,and in the age of Obama the groveler,they can operate with near impunity.

  19. 19. oldguy

    I’m 71 years old and spent the first 50 years in the south side of Chicago (47th st. to be exact). I saw an old black man named Elija Poole Muhammed began the Black Muslim sect that bought the old St. Connies Greek church on 73rd. and Stony Island. He founded an organization for the benefit of black males to keep their women in line with this pretend Muslim nonsense.
    The old man’s fight with Malcolm X ended in X being eXited out. Most of the big shots of this cult lived in the Kimbark, Kenwood area a couple of blocks south of 47th. st. along with Hyde Park liberals.
    The pretend Muslim nonsense continues.

  20. 20. kochevnik

    11@Judy, NYC

    Why do Muslims want to jihad you, Judy? Is it because you’re a bigot?

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    Awada layout Obosi Onitsha Anambra state Nigeria,i saw a rat after i priced a bike called okada that will take me to detination horizon,which the writer does not know .
    I turned left to Isunjaba street after i purchased a nutric sacheted substance,the rat will be in the dream of most sensitive man that my birth mark attracts
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  22. 22. Caro

    I believe it is called solitary confinement. Should be used on ALL suspected Mohammedans, terrorists, etc. No breaks, no room mates, no books, no radio, no exercise, no newspapers, no TV, incommunicado for the duration of their lives.Would that be cruel and unusual punishment?? I think not.

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