Man accused of online terror recruitment freed; Ujaama case continues is the headline that the P-I ran this NYT wire story under. It details the apparent failure of the British case against the UK-based business partner of Mr. Ujaama in their efforts to set up a terror-training adventure travel business.

Also, on Sunday, the Seattle Times published two stories covering the Seattle setting and investigation into the case. The first, Central Area mosque was 1990s hub for harsh rule, discusses the efforts of some members of the now-defunct Dar-us-Salaam mosque to enforce sharia in the neighborhood of the mosque, in Seattle’s Central District, just over the hill from my house.

The second, more interesting, in my opinion, details the experience of being investigated by the FBI as a member of the core group of militant Muslims involved in the mosque: Local Muslim convert under FBI’s gaze. Ali Shahid Abdul-Raheem was born Patrick Fitzsimmons and converted to Islam in prison. He comes off as a tough cookie.

I haven’t blogged coverage of this in the past, but previous Seattle-area press on this story has highlighted non-militant Muslims who worshipped at the mosque, generally complaining about the militant users of the facility. These stories all clearly described the core of the militants as American-born, and frequently as converts.

I’m very pleased to see some real reporting on this subject.

It was not necessary to suspend the constitution to investigate and defuse the threat to civil society presented by various rightist militias in the early and mid-nineties. It’s still not necessary to do so when investigating events and organizational networks such as these.