As the Nigerian airline bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab waits to get his conviction in the early months of 2012, a United States-based local handwriting expert, Ruth Holmes has released her report, saying that the so-called underwear bomber shares traits with other terrorists, including a keen focus and sense of purpose.
Ruth Holmes, a Bloomfield Hills-based handwriting expert who compared Mutallab’s handwriting to some of the United States’ more notorious criminals, noted that the confessed terrorist’s manifesto was written in a tight, spidery scrawl that reveals a “frightening intelligence.”
The Bloomfield Hills-based handwriting expert whose testimony in court cases has been used to verify the authenticity of written documents stressed that those same characteristics in Mutallab’s handwriting were evident in the writings of convicted terrorists Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City bomber, and Ted Kaczynski, the Una bomber.
“Those traits in the bombers’ handwriting aren’t unique to terrorists”, said Holmes, owner of Pentec? Inc.
Holmes also was quick to note that testimony about an individual’s physical or mental condition based on handwriting is not allowed in court.
Abdulmutallab’s penmanship is a mixture of print and script, which Holmes called a “high form level of writing” that denotes rebellion.
“I think I was most astounded at the intelligence (shown) in this handwriting,” Holmes said. “We find in this writing spacing between the lines, which is a sign of good judgement. Whatever his cause might be, it’s still an indication that the person has a way to decide exactly what he’s going to do.”
Other characteristics, she said, are apparent in a December 12 letter by Abdulmutallab, when he asked Judge Nancy Edmonds for a new attorney to represent him at his January 19 sentencing.