[The Reaper]

Today's article on JKI.

TR

Faces of 'Jack' Idema: black ops ace, nut case

By SARAH AVERY AND BILL KRUEGER, Staff Writers

Almost a decade ago, Jonathan Keith Idema sat in an Eastern North Carolina prison cell, blaming his legal woes on a vendetta by FBI agents angry that he refused to name Soviet spies who tipped him off to a nuclear smuggling operation in Lithuania.
Now the Fayetteville resident sits in custody in Afghanistan, accused of running a vigilante anti-terrorist operation in which he rounded up innocent Afghans, held them in a makeshift jail and abused them.

His defense? He was a good American doing his duty, only to be set up by the FBI as revenge for that Lithuanian spy caper.

In the world of Keith Idema, treachery, intrigue and drama are routine.

THE STRANGE CAREER OF KEITH IDEMA

1975: After graduating from high school, joined the U.S. Army, remained on active duty for three years.

1978: Joined the 11th Special Forces Reserves Group.

1980s AND 1990s: Involved in a variety of businesses that capitalized on his Special Forces background, including a company that trained people in anti-terrorism techniques, a company that sold paintball equipment, and a venture to set up Special Forces expos.

1994: Convicted of 59 federal counts of using telephones and fax machines to commit fraud and conspiracy. Sentenced to four years in federal prison.

1998: Returned to North Carolina after release from prison.

2001: Traveled to Afghanistan after the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center. Claimed to advise the Northern Alliance militia in battle against Taliban.

JANUARY 2002: "60 Minutes II" aired report of apparent al-Qaeda training camp tape discovered by Idema.

APRIL 2004: Returned to Afghanistan.

JULY 2004: Arrested in Afghanistan by Afghan authorities, accused of setting up a private jail in Kabul where he abused captives. Charges pending.

Idema, 48, has long said he participated in secret missions as a veteran of the Army's elite forces, claiming on his resume that he led a "classified successful rescue mission to the Caribbean for a mid-Eastern prince," was a firearms instructor for Ron Reagan Jr., and was a military adviser in Nicaragua and South Africa.

Much of what he says is difficult to verify, and those who know him have widely different opinions as to his veracity.

Some say he's an honest, passionately patriotic former soldier. Others paint him as a mental case given to illusions of grandeur. In the words of U.S. District Judge Terrence W. Boyle, who presided over Idema's fraud trial in 1994: "I think insanity might have been his best defense."

For all the mystery of the Lithuanian smuggling deal, Idema stood accused of a run-of-the-mill scheme. He had set up a shell company to acquire more than $200,000 worth of goods to prop up a failing business selling paintball and quasi-military supplies. He was convicted and sentenced to four years. Throughout the trial, Idema courted media attention -- an unusual tendency for a man of his military pedigree.

"That's going to be the death of him," said Patricia Dawn Glosson, his former girlfriend, who was also sentenced to prison in the fraud case. "He likes his name in lights. ... You can't be in black ops whenever you've got a big mouth. It's like having an affair and screaming it all over the neighborhood."

At one point, his quest for public acknowledgment led him to sue Steven Spielberg over the 1997 movie "The Peacemaker." He claimed the Special Forces operative played by George Clooney was modeled on him. A judge dismissed Idema's claim and ordered him to pay $267,079 in attorney fees.

Then came Sept. 11, 2001, and the subsequent war against al-Qaeda terrorists and the Taliban government in Afghanistan.

It was a war well-suited to a man who liked his name in lights.

2 views of incident

Idema arrived in Afghanistan in fall 2001, during the opening stages of the war. He said he was working as an adviser to Northern Alliance fighters.

One day in November, a group of Westerners, including journalists and other retired soldiers working as advisers, was caught in a battle between Northern Alliance and Taliban forces near Kal-a-Khata. A mortar shell exploded nearby, and Gary Scurka, a video journalist who had befriended Idema during the fraud trial, was hit by shrapnel.

Tim Friend, a USA Today reporter, said in an interview that a retired Green Beret lieutenant colonel rushed over and applied bandages to stanch the bleeding in Scurka's leg. Then Idema came running over.

"He ripped off the bandages," Friend said. "Everything was well under control, but Keith was reacting in an inappropriate fashion -- perhaps because it was Gary, his friend. We were looking at him: 'Are you freaking crazy?' The bandages were just fine, but Keith insisted on redoing it."

Another version of that incident appears in "The Hunt for bin Laden" by Robin Moore. The book features Idema prominently, both as himself and as a heroic character named "Jack."

In the book's depiction of the incident, Idema is at the center of action, taking charge and arranging evacuation. Idema tells the group to shut up as he rips off his black field jacket and redresses Scurka's bleeding leg.

Friend said his impression of Idema changed after the incident: "I liked him, but in my mind, I'm thinking, 'Who the hell is this guy?' He's clearly not a spy. Not military. He's one of those people who show up in war zones."

Later, as Idema's group was nearing Kabul, Idema said he discovered a cache of videotapes in an abandoned al-Qaeda compound. The tapes apparently depicted terrorist training sessions, and were aired on CBS' "60 Minutes II" in January 2002. Idema was interviewed in the segment as a war hero.

Sometime afterward, he started using the name Jack, like the super warrior in Moore's book.

'A dangerous person'

The question of who Idema really is and what he really does has left many wondering. During the fraud case, Judge Boyle ordered a mental evaluation of Idema. The diagnosis was a personality disorder, but not mental illness.

The court granted him considerable leeway from the conditions of his bail as he awaited trial. He was allowed to travel around the country for Special Operations expos; to meetings in Washington at the Department of Defense and with the International Associations of Chiefs of Police; to Raleigh for surgery on his pet dog, a Tibetan Shepherd named Sergeant.

Despite such privileges, the government considered Idema a dangerous man. Internal records from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, which investigated Idema for suspected gun violations, said he had an bad temper. The records describe an incident in which Idema, upset that an M-16 rifle was missing from a display room at his company's offices, lined up employees in a military formation and screamed that he wanted the firearm returned or "there would be trouble." The firearm turned up later that day.

"Idema is a dangerous person when his violent temper is coupled with the availability of automatic firearms," the report said.

During a court proceeding, an FBI agent detailed several incidents in which Idema threatened to harm people -- by shooting them in the head, snapping their neck, bloodying their face, ripping their heart out, bashing their head in and booby-trapping their car. One man told the FBI that Idema bragged of "slitting throats in Grenada."

Trouble with top brass

Idema's business depended on his Special Forces cachet, and he honed a tough image. His former girlfriend, Glosson, said it is not surprising that people considered him violent. "To an outsider, he would be pretty scary," she said.

Idema relished the mystique of having served in the elite group. An account in Moore's book featuring his alter ego "Jack" portrays Idema impressing a colonel by swimming two laps in a pool with a 40-pound pack on his back -- without once coming up for air.

He cast himself as a die-hard American, courageous in the face of injustice. "I am one of the few people that will stand up and fight back when he is innocent," he said at his sentencing hearing.

An official request for Idema's military records is pending, but copies of what appear to be his records indicate he received awards for scuba diving, parachuting, and pistol and automatic rifle shooting. He received a Good Conduct Medal. Court records, however, indicate he also had his share of trouble with military brass.

Federal probation officials cited a captain's evaluation of Idema: "without a doubt the most unmotivated, unprofessional, immature enlisted man that I have ever known."

Idema was given an honorable discharge, according to the court report, but was not permitted to re-enlist after his three-year stint was up in 1978. He joined the reserves.

Still, Idema had supporters. Among those who defended him was Timothy G. Connelly, then the principal deputy assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low-intensity conflict.

"Keith Idema may be one of the last individuals for whom the phrase, 'I give you my word,' still has meaning," Connelly wrote in a letter to the judge in Idema's fraud trial.