Bomber’s brother ‘downloaded web terror manual’
THE brother of a British suicide bomber downloaded jihadi material before researching explosives and ordering 500 ball bearings, a court has heard.
Mohammed Abbas Idris Awan, 24, a dentistry student at Sheffield University, is accused of downloading a terrorist manual and a ‘brutal and graphic’ training video.
He then allegedly engaged in ‘research, planning and sourcing of materials’. The terror manual he downloaded described how to use ball bearings as shrapnel in home-made bombs, the jury was told.
Awan’s brother, former British Gas call handler Mohammed Rizwan Awan, 27, blew himself up in Iraq in March 2016, the court was told.
Prosecutor Simon Davis said: ‘The defendant was found in possession of a significant volume of what’s called “mindset material”. It showed to anybody that (Awan) was aligned with extremist ideology.’
Mr Davis said Awan carried out ‘ stronger’ research on the internet, ordered the ball bearings and slingshots, and was feared to be about to put what he had learned ‘ into practice’. He said: ‘On May 29, he orders on the internet slingshots and ball bearings. On the 30th, he’s looking on the internet for how ball bearings might injure a human being. You might ask yourselves why that would be. He also researched how to make gunpowder.’
Awan was arrested on June 1 this year after the steel ball bearings, weighing 1.8kg (4lbs), and a slingshot were delivered to his family home.
Police searched the address and his student accommodation in Sheffield, seizing more than 100 electronic devices. Mr Davis said a terrorist publication called How to Survive in the West was found on a memory stick. He added: ‘It covers how to survive, internet activity, primitive weapons, main weapons (and) bombmaking.’ There were instructions on producing six different types of bombs.
The second ‘brutal and graphic’ publication, Commander Hamzah Zinjibary’s Training Camp – named after a former al-Qaeda commander – was described in Sheffield Crown Court as ‘an instructional video for would-be terrorists’. Mr Davis said: ‘It tells people how to kill, it tells people how to shoot, how to kidnap, how to behead, how to use certain types of guns and commit terror attacks.’
The bearded defendant sat impassively in the dock while his parents watched from the public gallery. Further terrorist material, related internet searches and conversations with fellow jihadis were found on Awan’s mobile phone, computer and two storage devices, the court was told. Conversations included WhatsApp messages between Awan and his brother when Rizwan was believed to be fighting in Syria in 2015.
Awan told police he had bought the ball bearings and slingshot to kill rabbits, and one of the storage devices containing terror material belonged to his brother, but Mr Davis said 835 files had been added since Rizwan left the country.
Awan, from Huddersfield, denies two counts of possessing terrorist publications and a charge of preparing acts of terrorism against unspecified targets. The trial continues.
‘Researched gunpowder’