30 spies probed London Bridge terror ringleader
THE ringleader of the London Bridge terrorist attack had up to 30 spies following him after Theresa May gave MI5 a warrant to watch him, it emerged yesterday.
Khuram Butt, 27, was monitored as part of a joint effort by intelligence personnel and undercover police officers at some point in 2015.
Officers watched him physically and intercepted his phone and electronic communications as part of a large-scale operation.
Mrs May, then home secretary, was said to have approved a warrant for him to be subjected to intense surveillance.
But as the operation failed to produce any results indicating Butt was planning a terror atrocity, the surveillance on him was pulled. He was eventually relegated to the ‘lower echelons’ of the list of 500 most urgent investigations.
Just over a week ago Butt, Rachid Redouane, 30, and Youssef Zaghba, 22, murdered eight and wounded many more when they drove a hired van into crowds at London Bridge before going on a knife rampage at Borough Market. They were shot dead by police.
Last night the security services faced further questions on why the surveillance was stopped despite a series of warnings in the years leading up to the attack.
A Whitehall source told The Sunday Times: ‘We knew Butt was up to no good. We got to know him intimately. We wanted to get him off the streets. But the view was we may not have enough to convict.’
The Home Office refused to comment on the claims.
It also emerged yesterday that Butt had been trying to get a job with a security company that provides stewards for Wimbledon and Premier League football clubs.
Investigators are trying to establish his motives for setting up a job interview, due to take place at the end of this month.
One possibility is that Butt had considered targeting the tennis tournament but, after the Manchester Arena bombing in which 22 people were killed, decided to speed up the plot and carry out the London Bridge attack. The three murderers wore fake suicide belts during their horrific attack. They were designed to create ‘ maximum fear’ and the attackers may have planned to use them in a ‘siege situation’ or to put the authorities off shooting them, according to police. The ‘bombs’ used in the belts, seen splattered with blood in police photos, were disposable water bottles wrapped in silver and black tape. Butt was pictured on the ground wearing his fake suicide belt over his Arsenal shirt after being shot by police.
Ministers currently have the power to authorise surveillance warrants so the intelligence agencies can respond quickly to threats against national security.
The Whitehall source said some suspected radicals are deliberately provocative to divert the security agencies’ attention from serious threats.
He added: ‘They know if they do certain things we have to watch them – they are sucking up resources. You watch these guys for months, then you have to decide this guy is not doing anything.’
Butt had been a key player in the terrorist group al-Muhajiroun, led by hate preacher Anjem Choudary, since at least 2009.
In 2015 – the year he was put under surveillance – former Al Qaeda recruiter turned FBI informant Jesse Morton mentioned him in a report and warned that he was a ‘rising star’ in Choudary’s jihadi network.
Butt also made an aborted attempt to travel to Syria in 2015.
At some point after this the surveillance operation ended and the security services missed a string of chances to stop him. He was
‘We knew he was up to no good’
reported to the anti-terror hotline several times and featured in a Channel 4 documentary in which he unfurled the black flag of Islamic State in Regent’s Park.
Last week police said he was on bail at the time of the attack after being held for a ‘low-level’ fraud.
Meanwhile, it has emerged that Choudary, jailed in September for five-and-a-half years for boosting support for IS, could be released by January 2019 as he will serve only half his sentence, with 140 days knocked off for time on remand.