Hamza ‘told off ’ terrorist for language

The Fishmongers’ Hall terrorist claimed he was “told off” by Abu Hamza for using “dirty” language, an inquest jury heard.

Usman Khan is alleged to have told his religious studies mentor that he was seeking to earn Hamza’s respect over his plans to create a jihadi training camp in Pakistan, an offence which landed him with an eight-year prison term.

But Khan said he felt Hamza had lost his edge after telling Khan off.

Khan’s mentor, known to inquests into the Fishmongers’ Hall deaths as TM, said the matter was brought up at his first meeting with Khan on the jihadi’s release from prison.

TM told the inquests: “This (story) caused me to raise eyebrows. He said he had perhaps been seeking to gain points in Abu Hamza’s book when he first met him. And Abu Hamza allegedly told him that was out of order.”

Hamza was previously jailed in the UK for inciting violence and was extradited to New York after an eightyear legal battle. He is currently serving a life sentence in the US for terrorism offences.

The inquests previously heard how Khan claimed to have been in discussions with notorious prisoner Charles Bronson.

TM said he came away from his meetings with Khan, in April and August 2019, feeling that Khan’s presentation “was very consistent” with a probation counterterrorism assessment.

TM said: “He (Khan) was saying all of the right things and doing it quite persuasively.”

TM agreed that he found Khan to be a “plausible and compelling character”.

However, he was unaware of intelligence that Khan had been suspected of radicalisation and bullying while in prison.

Jonathan Hough QC, counsel to the inquests, asked TM whether his views on Khan would have changed if he had been told about the intelligence against him.

TM replied: “Yes. (I would have thought) that he was being patently dishonest and he was trying to game the system.”

TM also told the inquests how, on their second meeting, Khan spoke about being “disgusted” by the Taliban’s attack on Malala Yousafzai, who was shot in the head at the age of 15 after campaigning for girls to be educated in her native Pakistan.

The mentor told the inquests: “At that point he (Khan) wanted nothing else to do with the Taliban.”

Khan, 28, from Stafford, fatally stabbed Cambridge graduates Jack Merritt and Saskia Jones at a prisoner education event in central London on November 29 2019.

Khan was shot and killed by police as he fled the scene on to London Bridge, chased by those attending the conference.

The inquests were adjourned until today.

‘LOST HIS EDGE’: Abu Hamza is currently serving a life sentence in a US prison.