Choudary link to terror trio plotting UK attack
Plotters made contact with bailed Anjem Choudary as they conspired to carry out ‘Lee Rigby-style’ atrocity
Islamist hate preacher Anjem Choudary continued to contact at least one convicted terrorist while on bail awaiting trial, it has been disclosed, as a court heard a gang planning a Lee Rigby-style attack visited him in advance of their plot. Members of the West Midlands cell nicknamed the Three Musketeers, who were yesterday found guilty at the Old Bailey, sought out the notorious Islamist preacher before conspiring to commit a terrorist rampage on British soil. The gang was caught after an elaborate undercover operation involving a fake courier firm.
ANJEM CHOUDARY, the notorious Islamist preacher, continued to contact and meet at least one convicted terrorist while on bail awaiting trial, it has been disclosed, as a court heard a gang planning a Lee Rigby-style attack visited him ahead of their plot.
Members of the West Midlands cell nicknamed the Three Musketeers sought out Choudary before conspiring to commit a terrorist rampage on British soil. The gang was caught after an elaborate, four-year undercover operation which saw police and MI5 set up a fake courier firm in Birmingham city centre and hire two of the plotters as drivers.
Officers planned to search and bug one of their cars, but instead found an arsenal of weapons stashed in a bag under the driver’s seat.
Following a four-month trial at the Old Bailey, the gang was last night facing lengthy sentences after being convicted of preparing terrorism acts.
Naweed Ali, 29, Khobaib Hussain, 25, and Mohibur Rahman, 33, collected a small arsenal including a half-made pipe bomb, shotgun cartridges, a replica gun and a meat cleaver with the word “infidel’’ etched into the blade.
Fellow radical Tahir Aziz, 38, bought a samurai sword from a sex shop for the terror cell. Three of the cell were already convicted terrorists. Hussain and Ali, neighbours from Sparkhill, Birmingham, had already pleaded guilty in 2012 to terrorist offences after they had set off to training camps in Pakistan.
Rahman, from Stoke, had been convicted in 2012 of possessing al Qaeda magazines. The trio met while serving their sentences in Belmarsh prison.
The Old Bailey heard Rahman and Aziz had apparently travelled to see Choudary on May 8 last year, while he was on strict bail conditions awaiting his own trial for drumming up support for Islamic State. The day before the visit, Rahman texted Choudary to “check that you were still OK with us coming.” He asked for an address and a postcode. Later, Choudary sent a message back asking: “Dear brother did you reach home yet safe and sound?”
Choudary, the figurehead of banned extremist group Al-muhajiroun, was at the time under bail conditions banning him from contacting several named individuals involved in his case.
The trial had heard that Ali, Hussain and Rahman called themselves the Three Musketeers in an encrypted chat on Telegram, a messaging app.
Sue Hemming, of the Crown Prosecution Service, said after the verdict: “The prosecution was able to show that these men shared the same radical belief in violent jihad and had reached a stage where they were planning to take action. Recent attacks have demonstrated the kind of horror these defendants could have caused.”
Mr Justice Globe was due to sentence the men today.