They wanted ‘to kill & maim as many as possible’
Prosecution claims pair plotted Manchester blast horror together
THE brother of Manchester Arena bomber Salman Abedi helped him plot the murder of 22 people at a pop concert, his trial heard yesterday.
Hashem Abedi, 22, allegedly bought nails as shrapnel and chemicals for the device.
Prosecutor Duncan Penny told the Old Bailey: “It was designed to kill and maim as many as possible.” Abedi denies the charges.
THE Manchester Arena blast was the deadly climax of months of plotting by Hashem Abedi and his suicide bomber brother Salman, a court heard yesterday.
And while Salman detonated the device that killed 22 concertgoers, prosecutors claim Hashem is just as culpable for his part in the preparation of the atrocity that also left 264 injured.
The 22-year-old bought the screws and nails that were packed into the bomb as shrapnel as well as chemicals, and built “prototypes”, jurors heard.
Prosecutor Duncan Penny QC told the Old Bailey: “What the brothers had set out with was a shared goal, namely to kill, to maim and injure as many people as possible by the detonation of a large home-made bomb in a public place.
“The prosecution’s case is that this defendant is just as guilty of the murder of the 22 people killed as his brother.
“He is equally guilty of the attempted murder of many others and in doing so he was guilty of agreeing with his brother to cause the explosion or explosions of a nature likely to endanger life. The crown alleges this defendant assisted and encouraged his brother to act as he did, intending to assist and encourage and knowing the necessary facts of what was involved in their scheme, namely the detonation of an explosive device constructed for lethal purpose, and intending that whoever deployed the device should do so with
an intent to kill, to main and injure as many people as possible. The defendant is just as responsible for the crimes which resulted in so much death, following the detonation of the bomb by his dead brother.
“This explosion was the culmination of months of planning and preparation by the two of them.
“The bomb was packed with lethal shrapnel and was detonated in the middle of a crowd in a very public area.” The court heard Salman, 22, died in the blast after he detonated his rucksack bomb on May 22, 2017, in the foyer of the Arena, where Ariana Grande had just finished a concert.
The victims included children, with the youngest being just eight, and parents waiting for their kids.
Apart from the physical injuries, 670 people were left with psychological trauma. A piece of metal from a 20 litre tin of vegetable oil was found at the scene of the attack, the jury heard.
Mr Penny told the court Hashem had taken the same type of empty cans from a takeaway shop where he worked, telling the owner he planned to sell them for scrap.
His fingerprints were found on bits of metal from the same type of oil cans discovered at his family home in
Fallowfield, Manchester, and at his brother’s rented flat in the city centre.
The prosecution claims the cans were used to make prototypes of the bomb container. The explosive used in the attack was housed in a cylindrical money tin.
Hashem’s fingerprints and DNA were also found in another flat it was claimed the brothers had rented to store chemicals. And traces of the home-made explosive, TATP, were discovered there, the court heard.
Hasham and Salman lived together after their parents had returned to Libya in 2016.
In the years leading up to the bombing the brothers had “begun to display to some signs of radicalisation … Salman more so than Hashem”, jurors were told.
Just weeks before the attack, Salman had allegedly told a teenage student he should “do chemistry so you can build a bomb”.
Mr Penny said the words were spoken in the presence of Hashem, who later insisted to police he had no “inkling” of his brother’s radicalisation.
Hashem Abedi denies murder, attempted murder and conspiring with Salman to cause explosions.
The trial, which the jury heard is being streamed in other courts around the country, continues and is expected to last eight weeks.
FACING the risk of being blown up by a suicide vest, a police officer kneels by Sudesh Amman’s body moments after the terrorist was shot dead.
These pictures, taken by a witness after Amman stabbed two people in Streatham, South West London, capture the tense moments after he was killed by armed police.
As officers stand behind shields yards away, their brave colleague determines the suicide vest is a fake.
The body then lay in the street for some time as police investigated the attack.