How did Tube bomber slip net?
SHOCKING failures to stop the Parsons Green bomb attack were revealed yesterday as Islamic State terrorist Ahmed Hassan faced life in jail.
An urgent review was being carried out last night to discover how Hassan, 18, who planted an explosive device on a packed Tube train despite being on the Government’s anti-terror Prevent programme, slipped through the net.
After sneaking into Britain in 2015, he brazenly admitted he had been trained to kill by IS in Iraq for three months – but still managed to hoodwink Prevent anti-radicalisation workers into believing he posed no threat.
Shrapnel
Security minister Ben Wallace said: “This is a bleak reminder of the devastating consequences of radicalisation. It is clear that there are some lessons to be learned in this particular case.”
The Old Bailey was told sullen and introverted Hassan built an improvised “bucket” bomb packed with knives, screwdrivers and shrapnel in the bedroom of the home he shared with elderly foster parents in Sunbury, Surrey.
It partially exploded in a huge fireball on a rush-hour train at Parsons Green station in west London on September 15 last year.
Fifty-one people were hurt, many of whom suffered serious burns and fled the carriage in a blind panic with their hair and clothes alight. Others were injured in the stampede to escape down a single staircase.
Hassan, who left the train at Putney Bridge – the stop before Parsons Green – fled to Dover where police captured him. He was carrying more than £2,000.
He denied attempted murder, claiming his bomb was designed merely to burn and not explode. But a jury found him guilty yesterday on what the judge, Mr Justice HaddonCave, called “overwhelming evidence”. He will be sentenced next week.
Hassan, who has self-harmed in the past, was under suicide watch last night.
Commander Dean Haydon, head of Scotland Yard’s counter-terrorism command, said Hassan was “an intelligent and articulate individual that is devious and cunning in equal measures”.
Surrey police and crime commissioner David Munro said: “Clearly there were opportunities missed and that is very worrying. As far as Surrey is concerned, it is obvious we were too slow.”
But Mr Munro stressed that he remained a “firm supporter” of the “essential soundness” of the Prevent scheme.
Surrey County Council said its work in helping to stop people from being drawn into terrorism “wasn’t as good as it should have been”.