He denied participating in the Battle of Qala-i-Jangi,[1] a violent uprising of the Taliban prisoners, stating that he was wounded in the leg and hid in the cellar of the Pink House, in the southern half of the fort.

[2] Brought to trial in United States federal court in February 2002, Lindh accepted a plea bargain; he pleaded guilty to two charges and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

[3] A convert to Sunni Islam in California at age 16, Lindh traveled to Yemen in 1998 to study Arabic and stayed there for 10 months.

[8] In early reports following his capture, when the press learned that he was a US citizen, he was usually referred to by the news media as just "John Walker".

He became a devoted fan of hip-hop music and engaged in extensive discussions on Usenet newsgroups, sometimes pretending to be an African-American rapper who would criticize others for "acting black".

[18] In 1998, Lindh traveled to Yemen and stayed for about 10 months to learn Arabic so that he could read the Qur'an in its original language.

"[19] At the age of 20, Lindh decided to travel to Afghanistan to fight for the Afghan Taliban government forces against Northern Alliance fighters.

[21] Tony West, his lawyer, explained it as follows: "One of the first things he told Army interrogators when they questioned him on December 3, 2001, was that after 9/11 happened, he wanted to leave the front lines but could not for fear of his life.

[12] He and other fighters were to be questioned by the CIA officers Johnny "Mike" Spann and David Tyson at General Dostum's military garrison, Qala-i-Jangi, near Mazār-e Sharīf.

According to other detainees interviewed by journalist Robert Young Pelton for CNN, Lindh was fully aware of the planned uprising, yet remained silent and did not cooperate with the Americans.

[25][26] Sometime during the initial uprising, Lindh was shot or hit by shrapnel in the right upper thigh and found refuge in a basement, hiding with the rest of the detainees.

[12] Finally, on December 2, 2001, Northern Alliance forces diverted an irrigation stream into the middle of the camp to flush the remaining prisoners out of their underground shelters, drowning many in the process.

[29] A U.S. Army Special Forces operator, fresh from three weeks of combat, gave up his bed so that the wounded Lindh could sleep there.

[34][35] When Lindh arrived at Camp Rhino, he was stripped and restrained on a stretcher, blindfolded and placed in a metal shipping container, which was procedure for dealing with a potentially dangerous detainee associated with a terrorist organization.

[32] On the day he left the Turkish School, he was photographed with the words "Shit Head" written onto duct tape on his blindfold[36] by Green Berets posing for a "team photo" with their captive.

[41] Although the FBI asked Jesselyn Radack, a Justice Department ethics adviser, whether Lindh could be questioned without a lawyer present, they did not follow her advice to avoid that scenario.

Michael Chertoff, then-head of the Criminal Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, then directed the prosecutors to offer Lindh a plea bargain.

Lindh agreed to cooperate "fully, truthfully and completely" with both military intelligence and law enforcement agencies in the terrorism investigation.

He served his sentence as prisoner 45426-083,[49] at the Federal Correctional Institution at Terre Haute, Indiana in the Communication Management Unit.

In January 2009, the Lindh family's petition for clemency was denied by President George W. Bush in one of his final acts in office.

According to the U.S. Department of Justice, all "special administrative measures" in place against Lindh expired on March 20, 2009, as part of a gradual easing of restrictions on him.

[52][53] In 2010, Lindh and the Syrian-American prisoner Enaam Arnaout sued to lift restrictions on group prayer by Muslim inmates in the Communication Management Unit.

[50] On January 11, 2013, a federal judge ruled in their favor, saying that the government had shown no compelling interest in restricting the religious speech of the inmates by prohibiting them from praying together.

Asked if he supported the Islamic State, Lindh, now calling himself "Yahya", Arabic for John, replied in a handwritten letter: "Yes, and they are doing a spectacular job.

The Islamic State is clearly very sincere and serious about fulfilling the long-neglected religious obligation of establishing a caliphate through armed struggle, which is the only correct method".

[53] Lindh was interviewed for the 2016 book The Way of the Strangers: Encounters With the Islamic State by Graeme Wood, on the condition that Wood provide Lindh with "books, treatises, articles, or other writings produced by leaders of the Islamic State and/or scholars affiliated with it (preferably in the original Arabic)".

[57] On May 23, 2019, Lindh was released early for good behavior from the Terre Haute, Indiana, federal prison prior to the end of his twenty-year sentence, although he accepted several probation requirements due to his continued support of Islamist ideology.