Clapham suspect is ‘being helped by others’
Counter-terrorism officers target Abdul Ezedi’s ‘associates’ in manhunt for alleged chemical attacker
DETECTIVES have said they believe the Afghan asylum seeker suspected of carrying out a chemical attack in Clapham is being helped by others, as officers began to “target his associates”.
Officers from the counter-terrorism fugitive team have been tracking Abdul Ezedi’s movements following the attack, in which a 31-year-old woman and her two children, aged three and eight, were doused with an alkaline substance last Wednesday.
The Metropolitan Police said that, in new CCTV footage and images released yesterday, Ezedi was last seen heading towards Victoria Embankment.
On Monday, the force released an image of the 35-year-old on Allhallows Lane, near the River Thames, at 21.50.
In new pictures, he can be seen walking along Upper Thames Street and then into Paul’s Walk, EC4, at 21.54. He passed the City of London School and then went towards Blackfriars Bridge.
The last sighting came at 22.04, when he passed the Unilever building and headed towards Victoria Embankment.
On Monday, Scotland Yard arrested and bailed a 22-year-old man on suspicion of assisting an offender.
Commander Jon Savell said: “We continue to appeal for information about Ezedi’s whereabouts. It remains our belief that he is being helped by others, and yesterday we arrested a man for assisting an offender. Our enquiries continue to target more of Ezedi’s associates.”
Counter-terror officers have been drafted in to scour hundreds of hours of CCTV in the search for Ezedi, who travelled from Newcastle to south-west London to carry out the attack.
Ezedi allegedly escaped by fleeing onto the Tube network, where he used his bank card to travel across the capital. The last time he used the card was last Wednesday, the force said.
The hunt for Ezedi entered its sixth day yesterday, with a £20,000 reward in place for anyone with information leading to his arrest.
Yesterday, a friend of Ezedi revealed details of two sex offences committed by the fugitive, for which he received a suspended sentence and was put on the sex offenders’ register for 10 years.
After being convicted of sex offences in 2018 in Newcastle, Ezedi was allowed to remain in the country because the sentence was not severe enough to reach the threshold for deportation.
The 33-year-old, an Iranian asylum seeker, worked with Ezedi in a pizza shop on Tyneside, and knew him as “Shapoor”.
He said: “It was so out of character; we were so shocked to discover what he had done to the two women.
“One was a sexual assault and after that he exposed himself to a woman who was on her way to catch a bus.
“He didn’t go to jail but was released and had a tag on his leg. He lost his job but he applied for new work and as soon as his tag was taken off he found a new job and continued to send money home.”
It was also revealed that Ezedi was twice refused asylum before being granted leave to remain after a priest vouched for his conversion and argued he was “wholly committed” to his new religion. The friend described Ezedi’s alleged conversion as a “joke” and said he came from a strict Muslim family.
“His father is a strict and devout Muslim and is a haji and a very respected man in the community at home. If Shapoor has converted to Christianity, he won’t be going back to Afghanistan because his father would be so furious,” he said.
“Whenever he spoke to his father, he would be asking him, are you praying? Are you fasting? Are you living as a good Muslim? It was so important to him that Shapoor was living as he had in Afghanistan. The idea that he is now a Christian is a joke but he loves money and he loves his passport so maybe he did it for that reason.”
Ezedi was described as being “very intelligent” and his friend said he had recently been accepted onto a course in Newcastle to improve his English.
His colleague said he was mystified as to why Ezedi had carried out the attack in south London.
“When I saw his face in the news and read what he was accused of doing I was so shocked.”
He said the only time he had seen Ezedi angry was when he spoke about his sister who had allegedly been murdered in Afghanistan.
“In around 2017 or 2018 it became known in his neighbourhood that he had sent a large amount of money to his family and there was a robbery on his home,” he said. “His family fought back to defend their home and he told me that his sister was shot dead... He said that he would take revenge on the people who had done that to her.”
There is no suggestion that the events in Clapham are linked to the robbery and murder in Afghanistan. Detectives previously said they are keeping an open mind as to a possible motive.