Jerôme Courtailler is a French radical Islamic extremist convicted of belonging to a terrorist organization.
Travel
Jerôme later traveled first to Peshawar, Pakistan, and later attended an Afghan training camp, and is believed to have played a role in supplying the forged documents to the two men who assassinated Ahmed Shah Massoud in September 2001.[1]
Courtailler grew up in an Alpine town. His father was a butcher who went bankrupt, divorced his mother, and moved to work in a meatpacking plant far away. He was raised Roman Catholic, and when to a Catholic school. He became addicted to drugs before converting to Islam at a Brighton mosque in 1996. Shortly thereafter he stayed in Zacarias Moussaoui's apartment, and afterwards travelled to an Al Qaeda's Khalden training camp in Afghanistan.[3]
Conviction for militant links and embassy plot
Courtailler was held in the Netherlands, suspected of attempting to blow up the U.S. Embassy in France.[4] In 2002 the case was dismissed since information was obtained from illegally obtained wiretaps, however in 2004 following an appeal he was convicted in absentia of belonging to a terrorist organization and sentenced to six years in prison.[3][5][6] He turned himself in shortly thereafter.[6]
References
^Vidino, Lorenzo. "Al-Qaeda in Europe", 2006. Prometheus Books
