As Yemeni officials squabbled over his $US5 million reward, he escaped in a mass breakout along with a number of other high-profile prisoners, and was added to the FBI Most Wanted Terrorists list.

[3] Born in Yemen, Elbaneh lived in the United States, where he maintained a "spotty work history", with his longest stint being at a New York cheese factory.

[4] Elbaneh was closely associated with the Lackawanna Six, a group of American friends living in the suburbs of Buffalo, New York who had attended an Afghan training camp together prior to the outbreak of the War on Terror.

[5] When the group went to Galyan's Sporting Goods in Cheektowaga to outfit themselves for the trip, purchasing boots, flashlights, books, diarrhea medication and other essentials, he laughed that he would just add it all onto his credit card account, bringing his total debt to $145,000.

In October, FBI consultant Paul Williams wrote a book Dunces of Doomsday in which he claimed that Adnan Shukrijumah, Amer el-Maati, Elbaneh and Anas al-Liby had all been seen around Hamilton, Ontario the previous year, and that Shukrijumah had been seen at McMaster University where he "wasted no time in gaining access to the nuclear reactor and stealing more than 180 pounds of nuclear material for the creation of radiological bombs".

He was sent to a maximum-security prison run by the Political Security Office, while authorities argued with the United States over the substantial $5 million reward, and who should receive it.