Abu Hamza’s wife pleads for his release as health deteriorates

Abu Hamza’s distinctive hooks have been replaced with a range of prosthetics which frequently break – BRENDAN MCDERMID/REUTERS

Abu Hamza’s wife has pleaded for her husband’s release from a maximum security prison in Colorado, as new court filings reveal his health is deteriorating rapidly.

Najat Chaffe, the second wife of the convicted terrorist, has filed a letter to a New York judge calling for him to be allowed to “come back home to his family, where he truly belongs”.

Mr Hamza, 65, was jailed for life in 2015 for a variety of terror offences, following his extradition from the UK, where he was a hate preacher at a North London mosque.

His legal team has launched a series of appeals against his incarceration in ADX Florence, America’s highest-security prison, where he has been kept in solitary confinement for eight years.

In her letter, seen by The Sunday Telegraph, Ms Chaffe portrayed her husband as a family man, and complained she has “spent countless years alone, shouldering the immense responsibility of raising our children”.

“The yearning to have him back in our lives has only intensified over time”, she wrote last month, adding: “To witness his reunion with our precious grandchildren and to enjoy quality time together as a family would be a dream come true.”

Abu Hamza was jailed for life in 2015 following charges or terrorism and kidnap – STEPHEN LOCK

Another letter from his son, Imran Mostafa Kamel, asks the court to ”recognise the enduring scars that the absence of a parent can leave on a family”.

“I, a 30-year-old man, still find myself crying myself to sleep at times, struggling with the profound loss and the emotional turmoil it brings,” he wrote.

Mr Hamza was extradited to the US in 2012 to face 11 terrorism charges, including the kidnapping of 16 tourists in Yemen, assisting terrorists, and attempting to set up an al-Qaeda training camp in Oregon.

Lord Cameron, then prime minister, hailed the guilty verdict at the time, arguing it was “good that he has faced justice and justice has been done”.

Following a series of unsuccessful legal appeals, Mr Hamza’s lawyers have now filed a last-ditch “habeas corpus petition” to secure his release, arguing that he has been kept in “extraordinary and unimaginable” conditions as his health deteriorates.

A 500-page legal filing sent to an appeals judge on Friday details the impact of his imprisonment on his extensive medical problems, including a double-arm amputation following a chemical accident in Pakistan in 1993. It says his sentence has become “nothing short of a living hell”.

The petition says Mr Hamza’s distinctive hooks have been replaced with a range of prosthetics which frequently break, and leave him unable to use toilet paper or apply cream to his patches of dry skin.

Violates extradition terms

It adds that he is “only able to open pouches of food by ripping them with his teeth” resulting in “severely damaged” nerves and several lost teeth.

Although he “was given safety scissors to open the packets” they are “difficult, bordering on impossible, for him to use,” it says.

The terrorist also suffers from overgrown toenails, which require “professional care” that he has been denied, the lawyers said, and has contracted Covid-19 several times.

Mr Hamza is permitted three 15-minute phone calls each month, which he uses to speak to his wife, children, grandchild and Stephen Coles, a North London vicar he befriended in London. He is allowed to send letters, but is limited to three pages to one person each week.

The lawyers claim his treatment at ADX Florence violates the terms of his extradition from the UK, where a Westminster judge said he was only likely to be imprisoned in solitary confinement for a “relatively short period of time”, and that a longer stint in a maximum security jail could breach of the European Convention on Human Rights.

Mr Hamza’s lawyers have requested that he is allowed to return to England to live with his wife and children, noting that “because of the nature of his conviction, he will be monitored by the British security services”.

%n

Discover Telegraph Wine Cellar’s new wine club. Enjoy expertly chosen bottles at exclusive member prices. Plus, free delivery on every order.