| Page 3 of 3 < |
In Montana, Casting A Web for Terrorists
Rossmiller's online experience, though, has soured her on many of the methods of the Bush administration's fight against terrorism. She said that the invasion of Iraq and the use of harsh interrogation techniques has increased the number of people in the Arab world who hate the United States.
"It has created more discord, and the numbers of brothers interested in violence have grown," she said.
  Judge Shannen Rossmiller, an online expert who works with federal agencies, and her husband, Randy, somewhere in Montana. (By Blaine Harden -- The Washington Post) |
Rossmiller has a knack for the minutiae and theatrics of wooing extremists over the Internet, according to Brent Astley, a Canadian software developer and executive director of a group of online volunteers who try to identify terrorism suspects and turn them over to authorities.
"She was one of the first, and she is definitely one of the best," said Astley, who in 2002 helped set up Rossmiller with software that hides her computer address in Montana and allows her to appear online as if she lives in Pakistan or elsewhere.
Astley said her particular gift is for "cyber-theatrics."
"She has chutzpah, and that is definitely required," he said.
One of Rossmiller's strategies is to warn jihadists that they are risking the lives of their Islamic brothers by speaking too candidly online.
She calls her Arabic skills "workable." In 2002, she took an eight-week, online Arabic course. Later that year, she went to Buffalo for a two-week course that focused on grammar. But when it comes to online deception, perfect Arabic does not matter much, Astley said. "A lot of the people that are being dealt with are not the cream of educated society," he said.
Rossmiller said she has been told she will be called to testify later this year against Reynolds, the unemployed man from Wilkes-Barre, Pa., who was arrested late last year near Pocatello, Idaho, and who a federal prosecutor has said was attempting to "provide material aid to al-Qaeda."
As for the foreign terrorism suspects she says she has identified, Rossmiller said she does not know what has happened to them, other than that some have been detained.
"I don't know what they do with these guys," she said. "And I don't want to know."
