An RCMP informant who infiltrated an alleged homegrown militant group has acknowledged the person now on trial had little or no knowledge of the group's plans.

Mubin Shaikh has been testifying at the trial of a youth who is accused of being part of the militant organization.

The youth was 17 at the time of the alleged offence and cannot be named.

Shaikh told the court on Monday that the young man had no idea what he was getting into when he attended a training session in the snowy woods outside Orillia, Ont., in December, 2005.

For the first time, a detailed portrait of the youth has emerged.

Prosecutors called him a shoplifter who stole goods for the group and helped the militant organization.

During testimony at a courthouse in Brampton, Ont., Shaikh described him as friendly, respectful of others, eager to please, but otherwise totally ignorant of Islam, world events, or even the plans the group was hatching.

Shaikh said the accused was invited to the training camp under false pretences.

Having recently converted from Hinduism to Islam, the accused was eager to learn. So Shaikh told him the camp was a religious retreat where he would learn about the faith and also test physical skills, as laid out in the Koran.

Shaikh said the accused never heard a word of alleged plans to blow up buildings or behead the prime minister.

Shaikh described the accused as naive in the extreme. He said the youth asked embarrassingly basic questions about Islam. Shaikh said any sophisticated discussion, including that of a jihad, or holy war, would have been totally lost on the accused.

The picture left with the court, so far, is of a youth who had no idea what he was getting into, had no personal or political motives for wanting to attack innocent civilians and was kept in the dark by leaders of the alleged plot.

The trial continues.