Mourning in London
Police unravel London assailant’s past as death toll rises
A police officer places flowers as people gather Friday outside the British Parliament at a makeshift memorial for victims of Wednesday’s attack. Police in London announced two “significant” arrests in the attack that left four people dead.
LONDON — Police on Friday announced two “significant” arrests in connection with the attack outside the British Parliament this week, as they sought to unravel the murky past of the 52-year-old assailant, a British citizen who they said was born Adrian Russell Ajao and later went by Adrian Elms.
Mark Rowley, assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, said 10 people were arrested Friday and were being questioned as part of the investigation into the assailant, who was identified on Thursday by another name he used, Khalid Masood. Six were released without charge Friday night, leaving four in custody on suspicion of preparing terrorist acts.
Rowley said the fatalities from the attack had risen to four people with the death overnight of Leslie Rhodes, 75, from the Streatham area of South London. The victims included at least 50 people wounded and came from around the world — a “pointed reminder,” Rowley said, of the global reach of the assault. Police fatally shot Masood soon after the attack Wednesday.
Rowley said police were focusing on several questions regarding the assailant, who had never been convicted of terrorism: What led him to be radicalized? Had he acted alone? Did he receive direction from a source at home or overseas?
On Thursday, the Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack, but the extent of the militant group’s connections to the assailant were unclear. Masood threw the heart of the British capital into chaos on Wednesday when he drove a sport utility vehicle into pedestrians on Westminster Bridge and then killed a police officer with a knife outside the Parliament complex.
Rowley emphasized that there was no evidence of further security threats, adding that the counterterrorism operation was large and moving quickly, with hundreds of officers mobilized.
Police were searching five addresses, had concluded 16 searches and were sifting through 2,700 seized items, including huge amounts of computer data, and video footage taken by passers-by on Westminster Bridge at the time of the attack, Rowley said.
One person was arrested overnight in the West Midlands region of England, where several people had been detained earlier, and a second was taken into custody in the northwest of the country, he said. Another individual was released.
At first glance, police said, Masood, who was born on Dec. 25, 1964, in the Kent area of southeastern England, appeared to share several characteristics with recent Islamist radicals who staged attacks in Berlin and in Nice, France, using vehicles to mow people down.
But they also pointed to striking differences, including his age and profile: He was 52, married, and known to his neighbors as a quiet man who often mowed the lawn.
In an interview with Sky News, Sabeur Toumi, who was identified as the owner of the Preston Park Hotel in Brighton, said Masood had spent his final night at the establishment, staying in room 228. Toumi described Masood as a returning guest who was “very friendly, laughing and joking.”
“My staff is very upset at the moment,” Toumi said, adding that it was difficult these days to distinguish between “the bad ones and the good ones.”
At different times in his life, Masood had been both. In 2000, a judge sentenced him, then 35 and known as Adrian Elms, to nearly three years in prison after he slashed a cafe owner in the face.
According to local reports at the time, Masood, who was living in Northiam, a village in southeastern England, left his victim, Piers Mott, with a 3-inch gash on his left cheek that required stitches. The victim, Piers Mott, would keep the scar the rest of his life, said his widow, Heather.
Masood was black, and during the trial at Hove Crown Court, the argument was characterized as racially tinged.
Heather Mott said Masood appeared to come out of jail “even worse.” She said she got chills when she learned the identity of the London attacker.
“And it makes you feel even sicker when you think, God, that was the guy who lived here. What a pity they didn’t realize he was a nutter,” she said.
On Friday, Rowley, the assistant commissioner, reiterated comments from Prime Minister Theresa May, saying authorities had viewed Masood as a “peripheral figure” and that he had not been part of the general intelligence picture.