The imam who twisted his faith to preach race hatred, murder and violence

His style was that of a celebrity lecturer, spreading "enlightenment" in a rich baritone with the help of jokes and references to pop stars as he addressed rapt audiences the length of Britain.

News of the arrival of the extremist Muslim cleric Abdullah el-Faisal would spread by word of mouth, and he attracted crowds of up to 150 people at a time. But beneath his jocular manner lay a philosophy skewed by hatred of "kuffars", or unbelievers, and shared by a web of associates allegedly leading back to Osama bin Laden.

Yesterday Faisal, 39, was convicted of soliciting murder and stirring up race hatred during his speeches.

The trial at the Old Bailey was the first prosecution of a Muslim cleric in Britain. It was also the first time potential jurors were banned from sitting on the jury because of their religion. The judge agreed to a defence plea not to allow Jewish and Hindu jurors, but in the end none was called for jury service.

Faisal now faces a lengthy prison term or deportation to his home country, Jamaica, when he is sentenced next month. The imam was found guilty on three counts of soliciting to murder persons unknown. He was cleared of two similar charges.

More than 150 of his speeches at community centres and hired halls were taped and distributed in specialist bookshops. He endorsed the use of nuclear and chemical weapons, claiming that the proper definition of jihad (holy war) is to wage war on non-believers, whom he compared to cockroaches.

He was also found guilty of two charges of using threatening and abusive words and behaviour with intent to stir racial hatred and a charge of distributing threatening, abusive and insulting recordings. He was found not guilty of possessing threatening and abusive recordings in the four years to February last year.

At the trial, which lasted a month, the jury was unaware that an attempt had been made to bribe the judge, the Common Serjeant of London, Peter Beaumont. He ordered an immediate police inquiry after receiving a letter from Scotland offering him £50,000. Judge Beaumont said there was nothing to suggest Faisal knew anything about it. Detectives view the letter as a deliberate attempt to discredit the judge.

Faisal, who had denied the charges, arrived in Britain in the early 1990s, and was placed under investigation by Scotland Yard's anti-terrorist branch after the 11 September attacks. For at least four years until last February, Faisal – a former member of the Salvation Army – toured cities and towns preaching to students and young people in "study circles" outlining the principles of the Koran and their application in a modern world. Rather than being told the principles of a faith which preaches non-violence, what they heard was an explanation as to why unbelievers – from Jews and Hindus to Americans and children – should be put to the sword. Faisal would expound his twisted doctrine in the manner of a seasoned yet streetwise academic, sprinkling his delivery with colloquialisms such as "brain dead" and "dodgy".

In one of his tape recordings, The Rules of Jihad, he said: "There is a difference of opinion among the scholars about killing kids who fought in a battle and we captured them. The most accurate opinion is that the kid who fought against us in the battle – you kill that kid."

Turning to the subject of what means could be used to destroy the "kuffar armies", he added: "Kill the pagans wherever you find them. You can use biological warfare and chemical warfare – weapons of mass destruction – providing you use them against the soldiers of the disbelievers."

It was a perverse view of Islam whichFaisal did his best to spread far and wide.

As well as touring community halls in towns and cities such as Manchester, Bournemouth, Cardiff, Swansea and even the Sussex retirement resort of Worthing, the self-styled sheikh set up a small media production facility at his terraced house in Stratford, east London.

Faisal arrived in Britain about 10 years ago after graduating from a university in Saudi Arabia with a degree in Islamic studies. His ticket to London was paid for by the Islamic Rajhi Company, a Saudi organisation which sponsors Muslim clerics.

For those who had known the Jamaican-born imam in his youth, it was a strange career. Originally named William Forrest, he was raised in the town of St James as a member of the Salvation Army. He converted to Islam at 16 and studied in Guyana for eight years. His reason for converting, he said, was "because I was told that if you reject faith in the last prophet, who is Mohammed, you will be in hellfire".

When officers from the anti-terrorist branch raided his home in February last year, they found equipment for a sophisticated copying operation to produce tapes for distribution across Britain. The tapes were sold through bookshops and were also advertised on the internet. Arrangements had been made for a similar copying and distribution system in America.

But a question remains over the level of threat Faisal posed to public safety. The jury was given no evidence of a direct link between his speeches and specific attacks, suggesting that his study circles were more forums for cranks than briefing sessions for organised murder gangs.

When asked during his trial about who he had a "problem" with, Faisal agreed to a vast list consisting of: democracy, scholars who call Islam an "inner struggle", Zionists, Christians, Jews, Sikhs, Buddhists, atheists, agnostics, the governments of America, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Algeria, Egypt, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, Iraq, Russia, India and China, the UN, Nato, the International Monetary Fund, the Taliban and Yasser Arafat because of his willingness to make peace with Israel and the fact that he celebrates Christmas.

But police believe Faisal's meetings were the culmination of a project to spread the views of al-Qa'ida and recruit young British Muslims for training in the group's camps in Afghanistan and America.

They point to the cleric's links with James Ernest Thompson, an American citizen also known as James Ujaama who is in jail in Seattle awaiting trial on charges of setting up an al-Qa'ida camp in Oregon.

On one of Faisal's tapes, Mr Thompson can be heard telling the audience of his experiences at a camp in Afghanistan and exhorting them to train for their "compulsory" jihad. The cleric said he had known Mr Thompson through his wife but condemned him as too extreme.

Anti-terrorist sources insist that Faisal was part of a loose grouping of activists with links to al-Qa'ida. They point out that he preached in Tipton, the corner of the West Midlands from where three young Britons travelled to Afghanistan before being captured by American forces and sent to Guantanamo Bay as suspected Taliban fighters.

He was also an imam until 1993 at Brixton mosque in south London, where the "shoe bomber" Richard Reid and Zacharias Moussaoui, the alleged 20th hijacker of the 11 September attacks, were later members. Faisal denied having met or known the pair.

One anti-terrorist officer said: "There was a chart of associations in which many of these people were contemporaries and overlapped. These were indirect links to al-Qa'ida. We simple don't know how many impressionable young people may have gone to camps and never returned. He was certainly in the business of encouraging young people to do so."

Call to arms

On the obligation to kill an unbeliever in battle:

"This is how wonderful it is kill a kuffar [unbeliever]: You crawl on his back and while you are pushing him down into the hellfire, you are going into paradise."

On jihad:

"Knowledge of jihad is compulsory on all of us. You have to learn how to shoot, you have to learn how to fly planes, drive tanks and you have to learn how to load your guns and use missiles. The moment you hit 15, you are a soldier."

On British society:

"You can go to the newsagent to buy a newspaper and what do you see? Pornographic material, alcohol, off-licences, night clubs, billboards. Kuffars believe in shoving their filth down your throat. They preach homosexuality to children."

On Jews:

"Should we hate Jews and when we see them on the street, should we beat them up? You have no choice but to hate them. How do you fight the Jews? You kill the Jews."

On Hindus:

"If you go to India and you see a Hindu walking down the road, you are allowed to kill him and take his money. Is that clear?