Abu Hamza al-Masri, the 62-year-old Egyptian-born Islamic cleric who is currently serving a life sentence in a “supermax” high security prison in Colorado, has announced that he is suing the United States government for being detained in “cruel conditions,” The Independent reports.
Abu Hamza was first arrested in 2004 in England, following a US request that he be extradited to face charges there. He was put on trial in England in 2006 and found guilty of incitement to violence and racial hatred and sentenced to seven years in prison; then began an eight-year-long legal battle to have him extradited, which culminated in 2012 when he was sent to the United States. He has been serving a life sentence since his 2015 conviction on 11 separate terrorism charges.
According to a report in The Sunday Times, Abu Hamza is now claiming that he has been denied family visits for the past eight years, and that his cell entirely lacks daylight. His infamous hooks, that replaced hands he claimed he lost in “battles for jihad” have allegedly been removed, forcing him to use his “rotting teeth” instead. He claims to be suffering from “stress and anxiety” and that his arm stumps bleed from being used to do what he used to accomplish with the hooks.