American Taliban fighter fights prison prayer rule - 13 WTHR Indianapolis

American-born Taliban fighter John Walker Lindh says the government is forcing him to sin by denying him the right to pray with other Muslims in the highly restricted Indiana prison unit where he is held.

Lindh testified in federal court in Indianapolis Monday as a trial began in his religious-rights lawsuit against the government.

The 31-year-old Lindh says the school of Islam to which he adheres requires Muslims to pray together five times a day, if possible, and stipulates that not praying in a group is a sin.

Lindh says inmates are allowed to do other things in groups outside their cells, but not pray.

Lindh is serving a 20-year sentence at a federal prison in Terre Haute for aiding Afghanistan's now-defunct Taliban government. He was charged with supporting terrorists after he was captured by U.S. troops in Afghanistan and later pleaded guilty to lesser charges.

A cluster of U.S. marshals surrounded Lindh Monday as he was brought into an Indianapolis courtroom for a trial on his lawsuit challenging a ban on daily group prayers in prison.

Lindh was wearing an olive green prison uniform and a white prayer cap when he was brought shackled into the courtroom. He smiled at his mother who was sitting in the third row of the courtroom gallery.

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