Jordan Horner is a convicted extremist who was jailed for his role in a “Muslim Patrol” which tried to enforce Sharia law on Londoners by shaming them in YouTube videos.
Since coming out of prison on licence, he says he has been reformed and is sorry for the distress he caused victims.
When did you convert to Islam and how?
I converted about five years ago after meeting a few Muslims, I was friends with a few Muslims before, but they weren’t really practising. Then I met more religious Muslims and they started speaking about Islam and after a process I became a Muslim.
What led you personally to convert?
A lot of people want to give reasons why I did things. They want to find a gap or a void in my life, ‘he did this because of that’ but I don’t buy into those things. I know why I did it because I was convinced on a personal level that this was my religion.
It did come from the environment I was in and from the friends I was keeping but it didn’t come from a void in my life. There are many other things people can do to fill voids in their life.
What were you like before?
I wasn’t well behaved. I was somebody engaged in smoking drugs, smoking cannabis, drinking alcohol and going clubbing, all of those things and I was happy with them.
I wasn’t disappointed. I didn’t feel like I was missing something in my life. I felt complete and fulfilled but when Islam came to me and was presented to me my heart inclined towards it.
You became radicalised, was this a gradual process?
It was in terms of the end process, to committing crime from the bit at the beginning of just praying. My belief become stronger and more convicted that what I was doing was correct and was according to Islam.
Through the internet, lectures online, reading certain books, and learning from certain individuals - all of that collectively, the way it affected me was it convinced me to go out in public and do these things as a propagation of my faith.
So the internet played a part for you?
Yeah of course - because I would search for certain lectures online and look at the videos of notorious individuals. I would listen to a lot of lectures and then move on to more political issues like foreign policy and Islam, jihad and all of this stuff.
That’s when I sort of took them lectures which were very specific and I made it generalised and then I sort of implemented that understanding on wider society.
You started working with Usman Raja from the Unity Initiative over a year ago. Were you initially sceptical about Usman and his work?
I first met Usman on my release from custody, my first sentence for the “Muslim Patrol” case and I met him through probation. I was very sceptical of what he was doing because he came through the probation service - so the same justice system that I’d dealt with and the same people that had put me in prison. So I thought: what benefit could he give to me?
The Unity Initiative talks about linguistics and that oral tradition of Islam - take me through how that teaching changed you?
When he approached me with these teachings all I had to do was basic research to understand that Islam is taught like this and the majority of Muslims don’t believe what I did was correct.
I had to judge myself and question myself and ask: ‘Is what I’m doing correct?’
In prison I really had time to think and reflect. I was meeting Usman on legal visits once a week and all of that combined made me start to understand. I sort of started to understand the wider aspect of my religion, not just what I had taken for myself.
What would you say to other young men who may be being swayed as we speak towards a more radical way of thinking?
I’m on my own journey so I can’t give a generalised statement to the masses to live your life the way I’m living my life. I can say I experienced these things and I’ve done certain things in my life which I’m not proud of.
I would say look to what Islam teaches you, the mainstream Muslims, and you will find your answers from the scholars and from people who understand the religion and don’t just cut themselves off they expand themselves and meet other people. When you find that you will feel fulfilment.