She’s the British mother-of-four who married a London suicide bomber then went on to become one of the world’s most wanted terrorists – yet has evaded capture for well over a decade.
Law enforcement agencies across the globe continue to hunt Samantha Lewthwaite, nicknamed the White Widow, over her links to a catalogue of atrocities that have led to the deaths of more than 400 people.
A series of mugshots of the fugitive in various guises have been circulated by Interpol since the international law enforcement agency issued a warrant for her arrest in 2013 in the wake of a massacre at a shopping mall in Kenya.
There have been no recent sightings of Lewthwaite, 41, who was last reported to have fled to a mountain hideaway in war-torn Yemen after splitting from her fourth husband – a ruthless Somalian warlord.
Yet hopes have been raised of a fresh breakthrough in the case over a British terror suspect’s bid to win his release from prison.
London-born Jermaine Grant was deported to the UK last August after spending years locked up in a Kenyan jail.
Grant, 42, was held in 2011 after police stormed a flat which he shared with Lewthwaite in the Kenyan coastal resort of Mombasa.
Investigators discovered bomb-making equipment in the apartment including chemicals, switches and explosives manuals.
Samantha Lewthwaite pictured with her husband, 7/7 bomber Germaine Lindsay
Jermaine Grant (centre, in a plaid shirt) is led away to begin his sentence on bomb-making charges in 2019
Lewthwaite is believed to have fled minutes before the raid after Grant reportedly sent her a text message warning: ‘The lions are inside.’
On his return to the UK, Grant was arrested on suspicion of being a member of Islamist militant group al-Shabaab.
He was recalled to prison for breaching licence conditions over a 1999 rape conviction.
Grant, from Newham, east London, was up for parole last month but his release was declined with documents showing that the ‘circumstances of his offending, progress made in custody and evidence presented in the dossier’ had been taken into consideration.
He could now remain behind bars until 2027 unless he is deemed fit for release.
An intelligence source told MailOnline that Grant may feel he could help win his early release by providing information that could help in the hunt for Lewthwaite.
They said: ‘If he has any information at all that could help in the hunt for Lewthwaite, who has consistently evaded the authorities, it would be invaluable.’
Lewthwaite first came to public attention when her 19-year-old husband, Germaine Lindsay, killed himself and 26 passengers on a Tube train near King’s Cross station in 2005.
Samantha Lewthwaite, from Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire, is among the world’s most wanted women and has been on the run for more than a decade
Samantha Lewthwaite, originally of Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, was the wife of 7/7 bomber Germaine Lindsay and is thought to be behind scores of suicide attacks across Africa and the Middle East
At the time she portrayed herself as another victim of the July 7 London bombings when in reality she was a dangerous extremist hell-bent on plotting her own murderous missions.
Lewthwaite – who is believed to have adopted a series of identities and altered her appearance through plastic surgery – is an unlikely jihadist mastermind after growing up as a shy schoolgirl in the Home Counties.
Her father, an English soldier called Andy Lewthwaite, met her mother, an Irish Catholic called Christine Allen, while he was serving in Northern Ireland during the 1970’s.
Lewthwaite was born in Banbridge in County Down, Northern Ireland, in 1983 before the family moved to the Buckinghamshire market town of Aylesbury.
She is said to have been introduced to Islam after her parents divorced in 1994 as she sought comfort from Muslim neighbours who she considered to have a stronger family network.
As a teenager it’s claimed she was seduced by the teachings of extremist cleric, Trevor Forrest, or Sheikh Abdullah el-Faisal. She would go on to visit him in prison in 2006.
Lewthwaite, who changed her first name to Sherafiya after converting to Islam aged 17, enrolled in a degree course in politics and the study of religions at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London in 2002, although she dropped out before completing it.
Bella Ramsey, star of The Last Of Us (pictured) and Game of Thrones, is set to play the White Widow in an upcoming film Girl Next Door
Lewthwaite is the widow of 7/7 bomber Germaine Lindsay, who killed himself and 25 other detonating a bomb on an Underground train in London (pictured: walking wounded following the attack)
She first made contact with Lindsay, also known by his Islamic name, Jamal, in an internet chat room and they met face-to-face at a Stop The War march in London.
They married in October 2002 and had a son in April 2004. Lewthwaite was heavily pregnant with their second child when her husband blew himself up.
Shortly afterwards Lewthwaite, who had been given police protection in the aftermath of the atrocity, cradled her newborn daughter in her arms as she said: ‘We are victims as well.’
She added of her husband: ‘I totally condemn and am horrified by the atrocities. I never predicted or imagined that he was involved in such horrific activities. He was a loving husband and father.’
Just months later, Lewthwaite is thought to have first moved to Kenya before travelling to South Africa under her own name in 2008.
But she was deported to the UK the following year and returned to give birth to her third child at Stoke Mandeville Hospital in Aylesbury in August 2009.
Seemingly desperate to return to Africa, Lewthwaite changed her personal details and adopted the name of Asmaa Shahidah Bint-Andrews.
She used her new identity to return to South Africa with her three children where she found work in a halal pie factory.
Her nickname among intelligence agencies is the ‘White Widow’, and she has been linked with a string of terror atrocities in Africa that have caused the deaths of more than 400 people
While there, Lewthwaite activated a third identity – that of a British nurse called Natalie Faye Webb, whose details were stolen.
She also gave birth to a fourth child – said to be the daughter of Kenyan Naval officer turned terrorist Abdi Wahid – at a private birthing clinic in Johannesburg.
She later crossed into Tanzania in 2011 and then returned to Kenya – where she began masterminding campaigns of terror as a member of Somalia-based Islamic militant group al-Shabaab.
Her terror links first came to light in the raid where Grant was arrested in December 2011.
Kenyan police discovered the bomb-making factory in a villa in Mombasa along with an AK-47, plus a photo of Lewthwaite and her laptop.
On the computer she had written a poem praising 9/11 terror mastermind Osama Bin Laden while fingerprints found at the property were also said to be hers.
And police discovered through a forensic examination of the device that Lewthwaite had spent eight years researching bomb-making and searching for the deadly chemicals used to make improvised explosives devices.
She was believed to have been part of a British-led cell which included her latest husband, British bomb-maker Habib Ghani who also escaped but was later killed in a gun battle in Somalia.
Security services believe Lewthwaite first struck in a devastating grenade attack on Euro 2012 fans in a Mombasa bar.
Two men and a white woman wearing Islamic dress killed three and injured 25 after storming the bar packed with supporters watching a match between England and Italy.
The following year, Lewthwaite was named as a key figure in the September 2013 Nairobi terror attack that left 67 shoppers, including five Britons, dead in a shopping mall.
She is also said to have taken part in the slaughter of 148 people by gunmen at a university in Kenya in 2015.
And most recently she has been linked to the Riverside terror attack in Nairobi in January 2019 during which a member of the SAS helped save hundreds of lives when he charged into gunfire to rescue trapped civilians.
It’s claimed Lewthwaite went on to become the ‘trainer’ of an all-female suicide bomber squad targeting Westerners in East Africa.
She is said to have gone on to hide out with fourth husband Hassan Maalim Ibrahim also known as Sheikh Hassan in Somalia.
Sheikh Hassan is alleged to be among the top leaders of al-Shabaab.
But in 2022 it was reported Lewthwaite had escaped to Yemen in a boat after her life was put in danger when she split up with the warlord.
At the time a security source in Somalia said: ‘She had protection from his family in a no-go area in Somalia but now she is not welcome and has gone back to al-Qaeda controlled Yemen.
‘She got there in a dhow sailing vessel. It is very dangerous in Yemen because of the civil war.
‘But she is a very dangerous woman with the blood of many on her hands.’
Since then, Lewthwaite appears to have vanished once again into thin air with some long-lost relatives back home believing she may have been killed.
But Lewthwaite was at the centre of fresh controversy just months ago after it was revealed a movie is being made about her life – focusing ‘unapologetically’ on the jihadist’s perspective.
Survivors expressed outrage over the planned movie called Girl Next Door which is to star Game of Thrones actress Bella Ramsey.
Director Bruce Goodison has said: ‘This film is about a young life-affirming idealist with a broken heart. Sam turns her grief into a strength that was then exploited by men for purposes of global terror.’
