discharged due to his asthma. we also ask his friends. what did he tell you about his experiences in the army? he said it was it was good at one point but boot camp sucked. he said it was too difficult on him. by now, bryant is in his early 20s, drifting. he doesn t have much money. and is eating breakfast cereal for lunch and dinner, trying to save money to go to cuba. and he does go, twice. in long island, bryant s getting into boxing. cuba s the perfect place to pursue that. over there, according to friends, he trains with a boxing instructor and for a while dates the trainer s daughter, a relationship that ended when bryant couldn t get back into cuba a third time. yeah, it hurt him. it s illegal for bryant to go to cuba but he gets away with it, both times. by re-entering the u.s. without revealing where he s been, claiming he lost his passport.
he is ahmed kaiyum, one-time duo devotee of the islamic thinkers society. i first reach him by phone. i m from cnn, yes. his number was given to me by someone who believes that kaiyum is important to my investigation. i understand that you may know something about bryant neal vinas. are you on his side or are you against him just because he accepted islam? he admits that he knows bryant and ahmed zarrini but he s reluctant to go to camera. he s scared we may be fbi agents. you can be fbi agent as well, right? trying to pose as an investigative reporter. the fbi, we re later told, is trying to track kaiyum down for questioning but cnn gets there first. he eventually agrees to an on-camera interview in pakistan where he is living. i don t think that american evil empire s going to last too long now.
every single day, because, you know, i think ibrahim didn t have a good relationship with his family, so he was with this caretaker you know all day long. they were like really good friends. the caretaker was reluctant to speak to us on camera. but told us their close relationship began to sour when bryant began spending more and more time with this man these people are liars! ahmed zarrini, a young man turned down by members of the mosque when he offered to run classes for the children. i have that feeling that he might not follow a guideline over books. ahmed zarrini was not a moderate muslim. our investigations have shown that he was a leading figure in a radical islamist group. the islamic thinkers society. counterterrorism officials say they ve come to the same conclusion. show disgust and disappointment! zarrini is front and center at demonstrations held by the
bryant neal vinas was a restless teenager. he was angry with his parents for separating, uncomfortable living with his father, a new stepmother. did he ever talk much about his dad, about how that relationship was? it was sour. so the relationship between him and his family were just they just crumbled. they shattered in pieces. and he started a new life with his friends. alex acevedo would become bryant s closest friend. he sits down with me for his first-ever interview about his best buddy. so tell me, how did you first meet bryant? where did you meet him? well, i met him in high school, longwood high school. he was lonely, you could tell. so as times went on i eventually tapped him on his shoulders. it was the beginning of a friendship that would last well beyond high school and
yorker, ryan neil venus. he gives an al qaeda leader detailed information about the operation of the long island railroad system. bryant is not providing the information from long distance. he is in the mountains of pakistan living and training with al qaeda. but he is not only helping plan attacks inside the united states, he is also attacking u.s. troops in afghanistan. we ve almost called venus the forrest gump of the jihad. he seems to find this way to get himself involved in operations or attacks that seem way beyond 20-some-odd convert from long island should be involved in. an american so radicalized, so dangerous he is willing to help al qaeda plot bombings that