John Walker Lindh, the US Muslim convert who came to be known as the "American Taliban" after being captured while fighting in Afghanistan in 2001, was released from prison Thursday after serving 17 years, US media reported.
CNN and The Washington Post reported his early morning release from the federal high security prison in Terre Haute, Indiana, quoting his lawyer, Bill Cummings.
Cummings told CNN that 38-year-old Lindh, still suspected by some of harboring radical Islamic views, will settle in Virginia under strict probation terms that limit his ability to go online or contact other Islamists.
Known as "Detainee 001" in the US War on Terror, Lindh's early release on an original 20-year sentence has resurrected memories of the September 11 attacks, when he became for many Americans one of the faces of the jihadist threat against the United States.
But his release also underscores the fact that, almost two decades later, the US remains mired in a fight with the Taliban with no end in sight.
Other than that he will settle in Virginia, the state abutting the US capital Washington, there was no information about Lindh's plans.
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His family, which lives near San Francisco, California, has not recently commented on his case and could not immediately be contacted Thursday.
His release comes amid concerns that he may not have abandoned support for hardline Islamic thinking while incarcerated.
In a letter this week to the Federal Bureau of Prisons, two senators asked how his alleged threat would be contained, citing unproven allegations that he "openly" supports extremist violence.
"We must consider the security and safety implications for our citizens and communities who will receive individuals like John Walker Lindh," they said.
Lindh, 38, earned a three-year early release from the Indiana prison for good behaviour.
The quiet son of a middle-class couple, he converted to Islam at age 16 and travelled to Yemen in 1998 to study Arabic.
After returning home for several months, Lindh went back to Yemen in 2000, and then on to Pakistan to study further in a madrassa, or religious school.
In mid-2001, ostensibly drawn by stories of the mistreatment of Afghans, he enlisted in the Taliban's fight against the Northern Alliance.
After the United States intervened in Afghanistan following the September 11, 2001 attacks, Lindh was one of hundreds of Taliban fighters captured by Northern Alliance forces on November 25.
He revealed his American identity to two CIA officers.
One of them, Johnny Micheal Spann, was killed in a prisoner revolt hours after he interrogated Lindh, making him the first American killed in post-9/11 conflict in Afghanistan.
While Lindh had no role in Spann's death, his case became politically and emotionally entwined with it.
Once back in the United States, he was branded a traitor and accused of murdering the CIA officer.
Lindh was quickly charged with multiple counts of terrorism and conspiracy to kill Americans, with politicians and generals demanding he be given the death penalty.
But in July 2002, he pleaded guilty to much-reduced charges of illegally aiding the Taliban and carrying weapons and explosives in the commission of that crime.
By most accounts, Lindh clung firmly to Islam throughout his imprisonment.
He spent years with a few dozen other Muslim prisoners in the Communications Management Unit of the Terre Haute prison, where their contacts with outsiders, media and information were tightly controlled.
An internal 2017 report from the US National Counterterrorism Center, obtained by the Foreign Policy website, said that Lindh "continued to advocate for global jihad and to write and translate violent extremist texts."
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