34 YEARS
... that’s the minimum Parsons Green bomber will serve in jail as judge reveals he lied about his age to win asylum
THE Parsons Green bomber was jailed for 34 years yesterday as a judge said he lied about being a child refugee and posed as a ‘model asylum seeker’ to get into Britain.
Ahmed Hassan was shown ‘every kindness’ when he was given refuge in the UK but the Iraqi teenager ‘cynically exploited to the full the generosity and naivety of the system’, the Old Bailey heard.
Yesterday the judge said he had lived a ‘double life’ and plotted the London Tube bombing with ‘ ruthless determination and almost military efficiency’.
The ‘devious’ bomber had lied about his age to get asylum after sneaking into Britain on the back of a lorry through the Channel Tunnel, having spent months in the notorious Calais jungle claiming to be a child refugee.
Hassan planted a ‘ Mother of Satan’ bomb on a District Line train on September 15 last year. It partially ignited, sending a fireball roaring down the carriage – injuring 23 passengers. Another 28 victims were hurt in a stampede to get out of the platform. He had arrived in Britain in October 2015 and told immigration officials he was a 16-year-old orphan who had been trained to kill by Islamic State in Iraq.
But Mr Justice Haddon-Cave said his tutors thought he was older than he claimed, adding: ‘I am satisfied that you lied about your date of birth on arrival in order to glean the special privileges accorded to children entering the UK.’
Jailing Hassan for a minimum of 34 years for attempted murder, he said: ‘I am satisfied that you are older than 18, but sentence you on the basis that you are no older than 21 years old.’
Yesterday the foster parents, in whose home he built the bomb, said they would not have taken Hassan in if they had known his real age. Penny Jones said: ‘I thought there was a good possibility that he’d lied about his age because I know that the police went to my dentist where he had had treatment to get his dental records to try to assess his age.
‘It makes me very angry because I wouldn’t have taken him if he was 21… there are people coming in that are a lot younger than Ahmed that I could have helped, a more deserving person.’
The judge said yesterday that he was satisfied Hassan had trained with Islamic State. This will raise more questions for the Government’s anti-terrorism Prevent scheme which failed to provide Hassan with a de-radicalisation mentor – despite him being referred for help twice.
Home Secretary Amber Rudd
‘Death and carnage’
will be questioned about Prevent’s shortcomings in front of the home affairs select committee on Wednesday.
Hassan was referred to the programme 30 months before the attack after being seen watching jihadi videos and donating to Islamic State.
For nearly two years, he lived a ‘double life’, acting as a ‘very polite well-behaved and exceptionally bright model student’ while harbouring ‘dark thoughts’ about the country that took him in.
In what the judge described as a ‘remarkable act of cynicism’, Hassan used a £20 Amazon voucher he had won as ‘student of the year’ to buy the bomb ingredients.
Inspired by Islamic State’s extremist ideology and a ‘deepseated hatred’ of Britain, Hassan wanted to avenge his father’s death in Iraq and was disappointed his bomb did not kill anyone.
The judge told Hassan, who did not react as he was sentenced: ‘Your intention that morning was to kill as many members of the public as possible by planting your IED [ Improvised Explosive Device] on a busy Tube train.
‘You were determined to cause as much death and carnage as possible.
‘You are a very dangerous and devious individual who quietly went about planning and executing this terrorist bomb attack with ruthless determination and almost military efficiency.’