**************************************************************************** *************** There are lots of lessons here for us all, and perhaps much importantly for our sons or little brothers and OUR relationships with them. Poor man, he just tried so hard to belong, and look at where it led him. I hope we all learn something from it. Regards Manneh ********************************************************** CHANNEL 4 NEWS SPECIAL REPORTS At school with Reid Broadcast: February 28, 2002 Reporter: Keme Nzerem -------------------------------------------------------------------- Links: The Guardian -------------------------------------------------------------------- Channel 4 News producer Keme Nzerem took a while to realise that the alleged "shoe bomber" Richard Reid was the same Richard Reid he went to school with in South London. He investigates how the feisty teenager he knew grew up to become an alleged international terrorist: When, on Saturday December 22, a lone vigilante allegedly tried to down a flight from Paris to Miami by detonating explosives stuffed in his trainers, it seemed like just another twist in the new world order. Like many journalists, since September 11, I had become inured to the previously unthinkable. Come Sunday, I was at work, trying to find an "expert'' who might help us unravel the shoe bomber's identity. Was he Sri Lankan Tamil Tariq Raja? French dissident Abdel Rahim? Or possibly Richard Reid from south London? It was then that I thought, what a coincidence - I had been to school with a Richard Reid. As the first pictures appeared - a sinister figure huddled in the back of a car - somewhere Richard's battered face registered as familiar, but it was a fleeting glimpse and I thought little of it. The following day I bumped into an old school friend. "You've heard about Richard Reid?" he said matter-of-factly, as if Richard had a new job, or girlfriend, or moved house. "He's the shoe bomber". I remembered the pictures of the day before, the shoe bomber scowling at the camera, clearly in discomfort, his eye puffed, his nose swollen. And I was then sure that this was the same Richard Reid I had been at school with. We were never close, but I remembered him clearly. His mannerisms, his lanky gait, his feisty attitude. He was someone everybody knew, but he was never one of the crowd. The Richard I remembered was a typical south London teenager. But as I read the first reports and digested the speculation, it became harder to separate the lexicon of the assumed al-Qaida terrorist - the loner, the weirdo, the outsider - from the gangly teenager I remembered from school. My first thought was of Richard mugging two of my friends on a train when he was 17. He was clearly as terrified of the ringleader of the gang as my friends were - he turned and mouthed "sorry'' as they fled up the platform. I imagined a gullible young man, confused, desperate to belong, and out of control. Richard's father, Robin - mixed race, working class - was in jail for burglary when Richard was born on August 12 1973. His mother, Lesley - white, daughter of an accountant and magistrate - began divorce proceedings within weeks. Robin rarely saw his son, leaving him to be brought up by his mother and her new partner. A mixed race kid in a white family. According to Richard's closest friend at school, that was the genesis of his problems. He was trying to sort out where he was from - his roots. It is now too late for Robin to be the father and mentor Richard never had. His mind addled by years of alcohol abuse, he does not recall dates, only vaguely remembers places. I asked him what Richard was like before I knew him. "Just like any other six-year-old. Inquisitive," he replies. Robin is engaged, animated. His words sluice out, in the wrong order, but full of emotion. He impersonates Richard. "'Who's that? Are you my daddy?' It's heart rending, man. 'Yes son, I'm your daddy.' 'Where you been?' How can I answer that? I couldn't, I just cracked up." At Secondary School Richard's confusion deepened. Thomas Tallis is a good school, but has its share of difficult kids. Richard - uninterested in work - was made to report to Jane Green, a senior teacher, at the end of each day. "He was sent to me by someone who despaired of him ever doing anything," she says. "He was never that organised at school. He never had anything. No pen, no paper, no books. Just a passenger." Thomas Tallis lies between Eltham - largely white in 1989 and the kind of place black kids did not feel comfortable - and Lewisham - which is more mixed race. The school bred sharp young guys with attitude. The racial politics of the playground changed with each year's intake and in our year, if you were black, you were meant to be "part of the club". Like many adolescents Richard was not sure what being black meant. That was not the problem - the problem was Richard was not good at being good - but he did not know how to be "bad" either. "He seemed to identify with the other black boys," Jane recalls. "But they didn't seem accepting of him. He always walked behind - bringing up the rear. I don't think he had attitude. He didn't have the edge. He just didn't belong." It is clearly not easy for Jane to talk about Richard. I am not sure how much of the hesitance in her voice is sadness, or if talking about Richard's problems simply feels like a betrayal of his trust. She is quick to dispel the myth that Richard was a lunatic waiting to be explode. "He was never rude, or disruptive, or aggressive. And always polite. He had a sense of humour. Although he was quiet, you could get him to laugh. I felt he needed more of that really." Richard's ordinariness is a common theme. Colin Yardley, our head teacher, describes him as "unmemorable". But by the time that Richard's teachers knew his school career was to amount to nothing, he had a life outside school, away from the ignominy and isolation. A generation of south Londoners grew up admiring the handiwork of taggers - graffiti artists - who scoured the city looking for walls and windows to make their mark. Richard named himself Enrol. I went to Brockley to meet Marcus Graham, Richard's best friend. He wants to show me an "Enrol" that has survived 10 years. Marcus peers carefully at the wall - but it has been sandblasted by the council graffiti team - leaving just the faintest trace of ink on brick. It feels tragic, like watching Marcus and Richard's friendship fading away. We drive to Deptford and stop at a rusty brown gate. He gazes at a tangle of white spray paint, traces the flow with his eyes - I get the impression he has not been back to see it for a while. I can just make out the letters: "Enrol''. Back at my house Marcus talks of happier times, when Richard was not just a memory on a wall. But it is hard for him to reconcile Richard Reid, his friend, with Richard Reid the shoe bomber. "I can't believe that somebody I knew, who'd eat rice and peas and chicken with me, would go that far. From listening to rap music and everything together, that he would go that far.'' As they grew up the pair dabbled in the usual teen vices - smoking weed, checking girls, tagging buses and trains. But once Richard left school, his mother moved to the west country with her partner and Richard's younger brother. Living in a hostel off Lewisham Way with no money, Richard was easy prey for local rude boys. "Certain gangs around the area would hold him at knifepoint, tell him to do this robbery. He had this hard man image he wanted to portray. But he was soft on the inside. He was quick to follow the crowd, if it would give him status. He was overwhelmed. It was that which caused his downfall.'' Marcus chooses his words nervously - clearly anxious they absolve Richard - but blame no-one in particular. Crime soon turned from hobby to occupation. In spring 1992 Richard and Marcus were returning to Richard's hostel when the police pulled up in an undercover car. Richard knew they were after him. He had graduated from shoplifting to mugging, but he was lazy, and did not bother to cover his tracks. He had left a stolen handbag in a bin outside his hostel. Richard was convicted of four robberies. He admitted another 24 robberies, 22 thefts and one attempted theft and was given a five-year sentence. According to Marcus, Richard only had one thing to look up to inside - God. The Imam, Abdulghani Qureshi, says for black prisoners in a notoriously racist institution, the mosque offered "escape in many ways - spiritual and practical. There's no authority there, there's a friendly figure sitting and talking to them, telling you to do something constructive." Inspired in part by his father's brief dalliance with Islam, Richard began to attend prayer meetings. But his conversion did not deliver immediate dividends. In September 1994 he assaulted another inmate in Brixton prison and had his sentence extended by 28 days. But by 1995, when he had been transferred to Blundeston, fellow prisoners noted Richard carried himself with an unusual calmness and peace. Richard struck up a close friendship with Neil Smith, an inmate on his wing. "Blundeston was an intense place with violent incidents taking place almost every day. So much so that you had to be 'firmed up' to survive in the place, especially if you were a youngster, as Richie was, but he wasn't into that 'gangster' lifestyle." A shrewd operator, Richard used his job in the kitchens to figure out who he needed to know to get by. "He wasn't a hothead. Even though he was one of the youngest people on his spur, he was really calm, and avoided all the trouble that was always kicking off. "He was a smart kid - I can understand why some people haven't seen that - because he thought before he spoke, didn't just start running off his mouth regardless." Richard's interest in Islam deepened. Neil says he never touched drugs, and gave up smoking. He began to corral his intelligence to challenge the world around him. The privations of prison life focused his attention on the world outside. It is clear Neil has very fond memories of Richard. In their prison environment where knowledge was restricted, intellectual companionship was sacrosanct. "He was a questioner and a listener. He wanted 'to know'. We talked about stuff that no-one else would; Richard talked about Africa, and places no-one knew about. Libya, the Congo - 'no go areas'. "He wanted to know why governments do what they do. I remember him talking about Saddam once, about how he reckoned he'd been set up by the West and then let down when he wouldn't toe the line. "We talked about the Iran-Iraq war. He was taken by the time a million Iranian women and kids went into war - it was suicide basically - armed with nothing. He asked me 'what must you go through to get there? Where life doesn't matter any more?'" There is a lull in the conversation around us. Neil trails off, looks oddly surprised by what he has just said, as if answering an open question in his own head. Richard left Brixton prison in 1996 and like many ex-offenders found his way to Brixton mosque, looking for spiritual guidance and practical help with employment. Chairman of the mosque, Abdul-Haqq Baker felt Richard was an enthusiastic young man happy with his identity. "He seemed at ease, relaxed. He was a consistent, committed individual. A nice individual to be around." Richard was an avid student. The mosque leaders invited him to travel with them - to Luton, Birmingham, other mosques in London - attending lectures and religious seminars. "He was exuberant in his pursuit of knowled ge", says Baker. Salafi Islam provided Richard with the guidance he had never had. He was "revived, answering a lot of the questions he had before he had become a Muslim." Back in Brockley, Richard's religion was greeted with ambivalence. It meant old friendships would never be the same. "He was wearing a robe and I thought, that's different," says Marcus. "He'd found his path with God and I was happy for him. It was a guarantee he wouldn't get in trouble with the police - he was on the straight and narrow." Others were more cautious, warning him to be careful, to "not go into it blind". Baker began to worry Richard's enthusiasm was "being redirected somewhat". He became quarrelsome with colleagues and had heated arguments over what he saw as Brixton's passive stance on the oppression of Muslims around the world. He started wearing military mufti with his shalwar-kameez. Baker says Richard began to find inspiration from extreme elements at other mosques - Finsbury Park in particular - who would draw manipulate the liberal teachings of Brixton to lend credence to violent interpretations of jihad. "He wanted to act now, as opposed to just sitting and learning, which he saw as just futile". Richard saw what happened to the outspoken Zacarias Moussaoui, who was asked not to return to Brixton. But unlike Moussaoui, in the presence of Baker and the mosque committee, Richard remained respectful. In 1998, Baker tried to warn Richard that his new path would end in trouble, but thought - like many over-zealous young converts - that Richard would come back. "He hung his head, he had a soft smile. Not in disrespect. He was embarrassed. He didn't have much to say. He put his shoes on and went out slowly.'' Richard never returned. Marcus too noticed Richard becoming a firebrand, his conversation peppered with talk of America being the "belly of the beast''. Marcus went to see him in at a hostel in Catford - an austere room with just a bed, a table, and the Koran. "That was his life - nothing else." Marcus pressed Richard on why he had become so devout. "I was trying to bend him back. He didn't take too nice to me about it. He said he was going to Mecca. Said he was going to go travelling. I never heard from him again. The only thing he left me was a Koran.'' Robin received two letters from Iran and Iraq, which he says were "straight from the heart''. Richard told his father he had "settled down", had achieved "inner peace". Peace for Richard spelt relief for Robin. But Richard crashed back into his life during Christmas 2001. Robin was walking to his house in Streatham when reporters dashed up and harried him with talk of plastic explosives, Islamic terrorists, Richard Reid, "the shoe bomber''. Later, when I ask him if he knows why Richard allegedly did it, his answer is certain. "It's a shout for help. I know my son is determined enough to do it if he wanted to. All he had to do was go to the toilet, sit in there and then boom! Why do it in front of passengers if it's not a cry for help?" I ask Robin if he blames himself. "Of course I feel responsible. I couldn't give him the love he wanted. I wasn't there - I know I wasn't - but I could have been." I am disarmed by his honesty, I thought he would fudge it, blame society, blame his mother, blame the mosque. "A part of me said 'he can deal with it. Take care of himself'." Another pause, as he sifts emotions. "Nah. That's not the outcome mate. That's not good enough. If I thought killing myself would appease people, I would. To say "leave my son alone". But I know it won't do no good." But then Robin's guilt is an absentee parent's prerogative. By his own admission he has no right to feel betrayed. For Richard's friends - not down-weighed by regret - it is easier to understand the choices Richard made of his own volition, neater to blame and forget. At first Marcus is thrown when I ask him if he feels Richard let him down. Richard, the victim, bullied and left to fend for himself on the streets of South London. But he thinks about it for a while. "He's not the same man I used to know. It's hard to say you'd disown a friend - but then you have to think about terrorism. 'Cos it could have been someone I knew on that plane." Richard Reid has pleaded innocent to nine charges related to trying to blow up American Airlines flight 63 to Miami on Saturday December 22 2001. The court case is expected to start this autumn. Some names have been changed. An edited-version of this articles appeared in the Guardian. <<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>> To view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html To contact the List Management, please send an e-mail to: [log in to unmask] <<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>