KINGSTON—Fahim Ahmad, one of the leaders of the group that became known as the “Toronto 18,” will remain behind bars, both a prisoner for his crimes and a system that is ill-equipped to deal with terrorism offenders.

The question Friday morning for two parole board members was not whether Ahmad would be released. It was simply when.

Member Scott Nettie described his role as this: “It’s an odds game … we’re like an insurance company here.”

But the choice was essentially whether 32-year-old Ahmad is released now, under supervision and into the care of the Salvation Army and imams who once worked for Correctional Service Canada (CSC), or wait until his sentence expires on Jan. 24, at which time he walks out of prison a free man.

Inmates in Canada are released after serving two-thirds of their sentence. Only rare cases, where someone is considered likely to commit a serious offence, as Ahmad was, is the inmate held past their statutory release date for their full sentence.

When Ahmad was denied release last year, it was because he could not show that he had a “viable release plan” and the board members were unable to measure how he had benefited from programs and counseling during his incarceration.

But Ahmad had not participated in specific counseling for inmates convicted of terrorism offences, or had a release plan specifically tailored to his crimes because those types of programs — officially sanctioned by CSC — do not exist. “They use the Catch-22,” said in an interview with the Star from prison last year. “They say there haven’t been any programs to assess where you are, so we can’t let you out.”

In the age of Daesh, and terrorist attacks such as the tragic bombing Monday night at a pop concert in Manchester, or the January mass shooting at a mosque in Quebec City, the case of the “Toronto 18” seems like a distant memory.

Yet on that June 2 evening in 2006, when SWAT teams fanned out across the city and arrested 17 men and teenagers at gunpoint, the world’s attention focused on Canada (an 18th suspect was later arrested).

There was fear: the suspects were accused of plotting to pack two U-Haul trucks with fertilizer bombs and strike downtown Toronto during rush hour, a third bomb simultaneously exploding at a military base north of the city. The suspects called it the “Battle of Toronto,” and their dark fantasies envisioned maximum carnage, killing hundreds of pedestrians and hoping shockwaves from the blast would send vehicles flying, like toy cars tossed in the air by tantrum-prone toddlers.

There was doubt: lawyers for the accused argued that Mubin Shaikh, the outspoken and controversial informant for the RCMP who had infiltrated the group, pushed the suspects further than they would have ever gone on their own. Could the group have actually executed this plot?

There was ridicule: details later emerged that the youngest of the accused attended a winter “training camp” led by Ahmad and Shaikh, where the hapless jihadi wannabes had to retreat to the local Tim Hortons to use the indoor plumbing. A lawyer for one of the youths focused on the donut shop during his questioning of Shaikh – to underscore the juvenile nature of the experience. “All right,” lawyer Nadir Sachak finally concluded, “so basically the trips to Tim Hortons were to take a dump and to eat some food?” Shaikh agreed.

And, there was disbelief: Comedian Jon Stewart summed up what most of his American audience was thinking when he said, “You hate Canada? That’s like saying, ‘I hate toast.’ “

The trials of the 18 took years, a phalanx of lawyers appearing in a specially-designed Brampton courtroom, and many twists and turns. Seven of the group had their charges stayed or withdrawn, or were acquitted. Eleven, including Ahmad, who made a surprise guilty plea in May 2010, were convicted of terrorism-related offences.

Ahmad was given 16 years, with credit for time served, in return for his guilty plea. The sentencing judge said he believed Ahmad had a good chance at rehabilitation.

For three hours Friday morning inside Collins Bay Institution, the board members grilled Ahmad on everything from his beliefs and journey as a teenager to radicalism, to opinions on the current state of terrorism, trying to link Ahmad’s group to Daesh today.

Nettie also seemed unconvinced that Ahmad could be properly monitored, at one point he questioned how his supervisors would know what mosques Ahmad should avoid. “You want us to put a terrorist back into an incubator?” he said.

Yet he also appeared suspicious as to why Ahmad would support a “highly-structured, closely-monitored” release. Why did he feel he required that, Nettie asked?

“I’ve been incubated from the reality,” Ahmad replied about his years in detention. “When I go out there, there’s so much more I have to deal with.”

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Nettie and parole board member Marilyn Kenny took 35 minutes to deliberate and did not give reasons for denying the release, other to say there was not enough new information presented.

“Next January,” Nettie said at one point during the hearing, “mazel tov.”

Written reasons for the decision are expected within the next two weeks.

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