Hook-handed accused terrorist previously worked as a nightclub bouncer and jiggle joint boss

Hook-handed Abu Hamza recounted his strange personal history Wednesday, taking the witness stand for the first time in his terrorism trial in Manhattan Federal Court.

BY DANIEL BEEKMAN
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Published: Wednesday,
May 7, 2014, 2:24 PM

Updated: Thursday, May 8, 2014, 1:29 AM




IAN WALDIE/REUTERS
Abu Hamza al-Masri was a nightclub bouncer and jiggle joint boss before he became a hate preacher. He faces up to life in prison if convicted of supporting Al Qaeda and the Taliban.

Before he became a hate preacher who cheered the 9/11 attacks and praised Osama Bin Laden, Abu Hamza al-Masri was a nightclub bouncer and jiggle joint boss.

Hook-handed Abu Hamza recounted his strange personal history Wednesday, taking the witness stand for the first time in his terrorism trial in Manhattan Federal Court.

“I was a co-manager of a strip club,” the Egyptian-born cleric admitted in a gentle voice unlike the booming baritone he used to rail against Western nonbelievers at the Finsbury Park Mosque in London.

JANE ROSENBERG/REUTERS
Hook-handed Abu Hamza recounted his strange personal history Wednesday, taking the witness stand for the first time in his terrorism trial in Manhattan Federal Court.

Abu Hamza is charged with aiding a deadly kidnapping in Yemen in 1998, plotting to set up a terrorist training camp in Oregon in 1999, and supporting Al Qaeda and the Taliban. He faces up to life in prison if convicted.

Born Mustafa Kamel Mustafa to a nonreligious family, Abu Hamza, 56, said he immigrated to England because he “wanted to see the world.”

He lived it up in strip clubs until friends suggested that his wife nag him into studying Islam, he testified Wednesday, wearing a blue shirt, dark slacks and glasses.
He lived it up in strip clubs until friends suggested that his wife nag him into studying Islam, he testified Wednesday, wearing a blue shirt, dark slacks and glasses.
“I was married to an English girl and I was working in this kind of environment that was not very respectable. They told her if you ask him to teach you Islam he’ll spend more time with you,” said Abu Hamza, who is missing both hands and is blind in one eye.
JANE ROSENBERG/REUTERS
He used two hook-shaped clamps to take notes during the trial but testified without them.

He used two hook-shaped clamps to take notes during the trial but testified without them.
The couple split up, but Abu Hamza became radicalized.

MATT DUNHAM/REUTERS
Documents show Abu Hamza secretly protected London from terror strikes by acting as a go-between between radicals and investigators from 1997 to 2000, the defense claims.

He repeatedly replied “no” when asked if he did what prosecutors claim and vowed to tell the truth, saying, “If my freedom comes at the expense of my dignity and my belief, I don’t want it.”

Documents show Abu Hamza secretly protected London from terror strikes by acting as a go-between between radicals and investigators from 1997 to 2000, the defense claims.

SALEH RIFAI/AP
Mary Quin, pictured in 1999, testified in Manhattan Federal Court during the trial of accused terrorist Abu Hamza al-Masri about how she and others escaped a group of militants who took them hostage in Yemen in 1998.

Abu Hamza was preceded on the stand by Mary Quin, a tourist who said she stomped on a man to wrest an AK-47 from his hands during the Yemen kidnapping.

“I put my foot down on his head and that gave me the leverage to get the gun out of his hands,” the New Zealand-born American said.




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