Jill Whittaker: The Third Associate in the Kazakh Trio

Posted by AxelPrice on March 21st, 2014

Jill Whittaker is allegedly a close associate of the Kazakh trio, which was rumored to be the force behind the proposed 1000 ton yellowcake (uranium 308) shipment. The two main accused in the case, Patrick Campbell and Mahmood Memarian were reportedly the more active members of the trio. But if sources are to be believed, Whittaker had a key role in the communication with the buyers.

The entire plot of the scandal was initiated with an advertisement on the website alibaba.com. Campbell was the first to see the advertisement on the website. It was about someone looking to buy yellowcake or Uranium 308. Yellowcake is the raw material from which actual radioactive uranium is processed. In other words, it is the nascent uranium that is extracted from the mines.

Campbell told the buyer that he was the owner of three uranium mines in Sierra Leone. As the trio showed interest in the deal and escalated communication with the buyers, they agreed to ship the material to Bander Abbas port in Iran. It was here that the trio claimed that they would easily watch over the process of the shipment of the 1000 ton Yellowcake from Sierra Leone in the United States to Bander Abbas, Iran.

While the correspondence was entirely handled by Campbell and Memarian, Jill Whittaker became their go-to person. The two claimed that they worked with a company named Horizon ltd, which was based in Sierra Leone. They claimed that the company dealt in the mining of diamonds, gold and uranium. They also claimed that there would be no problem in the shipment as they had the backing of their country and a strong network in the ports that would be sufficient in dealing with any threat whatsoever. Campbell also agreed to show a sample of yellowcake to the buyers in Florida.

On the flip side, the advertisement in the website was posted by a federal agent of the United States. So, there was no buyer in the first place. The state was investigating the files of the trio for quite some time now and decided to lay the trap for them. As soon as they responded to the advertisement, they were placed under surveillance. The months of communication that they were involved in was actually with the federal agencies. During this time period, the agencies were able to retrieve vital information about the trio as well uranium smuggling on the whole.

According to the plan, Campbell was supposed to pass the quality check of the yellowcake before the shipment of the bulk material. On 21st August 2013, Campbell set on a journey from Sierra Leone to Florida. He was arrested when he entered Queens, New York. The police found a pair of shoes in his luggage that had yellowcake hidden in the soles. He confessed that he was taking the sample to a buyer for inspection of quality. However, Mahmood Memarian escaped the authorities and is still at large. Since the arrest of Campbell, nothing much has been heard about Jill Whittaker. Presently, Jill continues to be a mystery to the agencies.     

More information on Jill Whittaker can be found here.