Jesse Morton was 16 when he ran away, trailed a Grateful Dead tour and scraped a living from the proceeds of drugs peddled outside concerts in the mid-90s. Caught and jailed for drug offences, he was radicalized in a prison in Virginia. Bin Laden became an idol and he himself a notable recruiter for Al-Qaeda. It is said that he inspired some of those who plotted to send a remote-controlled, explosive-packed plane into the Pentagon.
Following a process of so-called de-conversion and work for the FBI, it is widely reported that today he pursues a new career to win back the hearts and minds of the kind of people he previously cultivated to fight the West. Talking to The New York Times in August, he declared himself ‘100 per cent de-radicalized’.
