KILLER AT HER TABLE
BY TOM PETTIFOR SECRETLY armed with knives and wearing a fake suicide belt, terrorist Usman Khan is pictured chatting to one of his murder victims minutes before stabbing her in the neck.
In a five-minute rampage, Khan killed Cambridge University graduates Saskia Joines, 23, and Jack Merritt, 25.
The picture is from footage shown at an inquest into their deaths.
Det Chief Insp Dan Brown recounted the horrific events of November 29, 2019, at the prisoner rehabilitation event held at London’s Fishmongers’ Hall.
He said Khan armed himself with two 8in blades in the toilets where he left a prayer book and a bag containing a third.
He emerged from the cubicle and stabbed Jack 12 times, including a fatal wound to the chest. The CCTV footage showed the graduate staggering around with blood soaked through his white shirt. Khan then went to the cloakroom and knifed Saskia in the neck causing a “catastrophic haemorrhage”.
She stumbled towards the bottom of a flight of stairs before collapsing.
Khan also stabbed Stephanie Szczotko and Isobel Rowbotham, returning at one point to plunge the blade in again as his victim lay prone on the floor.
A number of people from the event
ATROCITY Khan’s fake suicide belt confronted Khan, including one with an ornamental pike from a wall.
Hero Steven Gallant, a prisoner on day release, tried to tackle Khan with a narwhal tusk on nearby London Bridge. He was helped by John Crilly and Darryn Frost as passers-by ran for their lives.
Armed police then ordered members
WEAPON Knife with Allah symbol of the public to stand back before he was shot dead and tasered.
Khan is believed to have taped the fake bomb, made from Xbox parts and bandages wrapped in cling film, to him on a train from Stafford to London that morning.
One of his knives had a symbol for Allah on it. Jack’s mum Anne Merritt read tributes from his friends and family, calling him as “immensely loyal”, “extremely funny” and a “very cool brother” with an “infectious smile and a never-ending passion and drive for life”.
Henry Pitchers QC said of Saskia: “It would be her hope that no other family is devastated and heartbroken again in similar circumstances.”
The hearing continues at the Guildhall in the City of London.
Jack