Met offers £20k reward as hunt for Clapham suspect drags on

SCOTLAND YARD has offered a £20,000 reward for information that could end the five-day manhunt for the Clapham alkali attacker.

As officers confirmed that a “very strong concentrated corrosive substance” was used in the attack, they offered the bounty for information that leads to the arrest of Abdul Ezedi, 35.

The Afghan national, who is described as having very “significant injuries to the right side of his face, has been on the run since Wednesday evening after a 31-year-old woman suffered potentially life-changing injuries while her daughters, aged eight and three, were also hurt in the attack in Clapham, south-west London.

Officers said the substance used in the attack was either liquid sodium hydroxide or liquid sodium carbonate, which are used in detergents and to make soaps, while sodium hydroxide is also used in drain cleaners.

Detectives on Sunday updated his last known sighting to Tower Hill station in east London late on Wednesday evening. He was spotted at the station, yards from the Tower of London, at 9.33pm, having taken a train from Victoria.

Previous sightings put him at King’s Cross Station at about 9pm on Jan 31 and police said he boarded a Victoria Line train to Victoria Station, arriving at 9.10pm, before switching to an eastbound District Line train.

Detectives have warned that anyone harbouring the fugitive is committing an offence and a charity which helps Afghan nationals in the UK on Sunday appealed for Ezedi to turn himself in.

In an appeal directly to Ezedi, Darius Nasimi, of the charity the Afghanistan & Central Asian Association, told him to go to a police station “immediately”.

He said: “You have a serious injury that needs to be seen to but, more importantly, you must do the right thing and hand yourself in to police. This has gone on for long enough.”

Experts said Ezedi is likely to have been helped to avoid detection or may be “hardened” to sleeping rough.

Ezedi travelled 280 miles from Newcastle to allegedly commit the attack and has been using cash and a contract-free phone making him difficult to detect. The attack has prompted a backlash over how he was granted asylum despite having a conviction for a sex offence.

280 Number of miles suspect Abdul Ezedi travelled to launch attack on woman and her daughters