FORMER Taliban fighter and confessed terrorism supporter David Hicks walked free from jail yesterday  six years after his capture in Afghanistan and seven months after he was brought home from Cuba's notorious Guantanamo Bay prison to serve out his sentence.
His incarceration, which made headlines around the world, came to an end at 8.17am when he walked from Adelaide's Yatala Labour Prison to a waiting car.
Hicks' release at the end of the nine-month prison term imposed on him in March by the US military commissions closed a chapter in the life of the military adventurer and one-time Muslim convert who was arrested trying to flee Afghanistan two months after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Now 32 and no longer a Muslim, Hicks yesterday promised not to let down the Australian community he credited with helping to bring him home. "I will not forget, or let you down," Hicks said in a statement read by his lawyer, David McLeod.
Mr McLeod, who began representing Hicks in 2005 and visited him at Guantanamo Bay prison at least six times, said Hicks had tearfully embraced his father, Terry, after pre-release papers were signed.
"He was relieved, elated, (felt) great to be a free man for the first time in six years," Mr McLeod told reporters.
As Hicks left the gatehouse, he looked in amazement at the group of up to 70 media people behind a police barrier, observing and photographing his every move with long-range lenses. Helicopters buzzed overhead as camera crews and photographers vied for the best view.
Before his statement was read, Hicks was driven slowly through the prison gates in the back of a blue sedan with a member of his extended family, Terry Hicks' first wife and Fair Go For David support group organiser Bronwyn Mewett. Police escorted his car and prevented the media from trailing him.
Hicks' location is being kept secret, at his request, so he can resume as normal a life as possible while dealing with the psychological fallout from prolonged detention, much of it spent in solitary confinement under a US military regime of deliberate psychological stress and deprivation.
In his statement, which he was too unsettled to read, Hicks asked for space. "I ask that you respect my privacy as I will need time to readjust to society and to obtain medical care for the consequences of 5½ years at Guantanamo Bay," he said. "I have been told that my readjustment will be a slow process."
Back of Yatala Labour Prison, Northfield, South Australia.
Australian David Hicks was released Saturday from Yatala Labour Prison in Adelaide, South Australia.

Hicks, who until May 2007 had been held for five years at the U.S. Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba, was serving out his remaining sentence in an Australian jail. At a U.S. war crimes tribunal, Hicks pleaded guilty to providing material support to a listed terrorist organisation and was sentenced to seven years in prison. As part of the plea agreement, all but nine months of the sentence was suspended and in May of 2007, Hicks was transferred to Yatala.

A contentious part of his sentence was a ban placed on Hicks to prevent him from speaking with the media for a period of one year from the time he pleaded guilty, which was in March, 2007. On his release Saturday, Hicks indicated that he intended to comply with the suppression order.

"It's my intention to honour this agreement as I don't want to do anything that might result in my return there," said Hicks in a written statement read by his lawyer, David McLeod. "So for now, I will limit what I have to say - I will say more at a later time."

A small group of supporters waited outside of Yatala and cheered as his car drove away. In his statement, Hicks had thanked his supporters for "the huge debt of gratitude that I owe the Australian public for getting me home." He added, "I will not forget or let you down."

At his trial, Hicks admitted he attended training camps in Afghanistan, conducted surveillance of the U.S. Embassy in Kabul and revealed that he had met Osama bin Laden, leader of Al-Qaeda. He had participated in fighting against the U.S. and its allies in Afghanistan in late 2001, and was caught while trying to flee the area.
David Hicks leaving Yatala Labour Prison. 
On his release from prison Saturday, Hicks was driven to an undisclosed location in Adelaide. His lawyer said that Hicks fears for the safety of himself and his family. "David is concerned about the safety of his family from people who hold views he was purported to share," said David McLeod. "There are also a number of far-right nationalist groups in Australia who have spoken out about David."

Terry Hicks, David's father, said his son was pleased to be free. "He's on a high, he seems alright but I suppose in the quiet times everything will come back."

"It's now up to him," said Terry Hicks. "He now has got to get on with his life."