“John Walker Lindh was sent to the United States aboard a military plane and under high security to face charges he conspired with terrorists to kill fellow Americans,” the AP reports.

Taliban fighter Lindh was taken off the USS Bataan warship in the Arabian Sea by helicopter and transferred to another military plane at the airport at the southern Afghan city of Kandahar, officials said. They also spoke on condition of anonymity.

The Pentagon officially was not confirming the transfer, saying it would be dangerous to release any information about his movements. And journalists were kept away from the area at Kandahar where Lindh boarded the plane.

Another official said Wednesday that Lindh was moved in restraints but gave no details.

Lindh was expected to arrive in suburban Washington – where he will be tried in federal court – sometime Wednesday.

The 20-year-old Californian converted to Islam four years ago and took up the cause of Muslim radicals, fighting alongside the Taliban in Afghanistan and even meeting with Osama bin Laden at an al-Qaida terrorist training camp, his federal indictment says.

Portrait of the traitor as a young man