Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Town mourns park victims in suspected terror attack
LONDON — The English town of Reading mourned Monday for three people stabbed to death as they sat in a park in what is being treated as a terror attack, gathering for a moment of silence as police questioned the alleged lone attacker.
More than 100 students lit candles and laid flowers in memory of history teacher James Furlong, who was named as one of the victims. At Holt School in nearby Wokingham, where he taught, a flag in the courtyard had been lowered to half-staff.
Furlong’s friend, Joe Ritchie-Bennett, 39, was named by his family in Philadelphia as the second victim. The identity of the third victim has not been released.
The stabbing rampage took place Saturday night as groups of people relaxed in Forbury Gardens park in Reading, a town of 200,000 people 40 miles west of London. A 25-year-old suspect is in custody, but officials say the motive for the carnage is unclear.
Chief Constable John
Campbell of Thames Valley Police said officers were called to reports of stabbings just before 7 p.m. and arrived to find a “horrific” scene. Unarmed officers detained the suspect within five minutes.
Police have not identified the suspect, but Britain’s national news agency, Press Association, and other media outlets named the alleged attacker as Khairi Saadallah, a Libyan asylum-seeker living in Reading.
Saadallah had been depressed and received psychological treatment because of the chaos in Libya after the NATO-backed uprising that toppled and then killed dictator Moammar Gadhafi, a family member in Tripoli told The Associated Press.
The relative said Saadallah was born to a wealthy family in the city of Tripoli. He lived in a villa and went to private schools in Libya. Though he supported Gadhafi’s ouster, he became disillusioned with the chaotic aftermath.
The relative, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Saadallah had lived in Britain since he was 17 and had adopted a Western lifestyle, with a girlfriend and tattoos.
The BBC reported that Saadallah was investigated by British security services last year over concerns he planned to travel abroad to join a jihadi group, but that he was not determined to be a major threat.
Questions were immediately raised about whether he should have been under closer watch. But Mark Rowley, former assistant commissioner for specialist operations in the Metropolitan Police, told the BBC that the task is daunting, given that some 40,000 people have touched the system.
Police have two weeks to question the suspect without charge because he was arrested under the Terrorism Act.
The Philadelphia Inquirer quoted the father of Ritchie-Bennett as saying his son had moved to England around 15 years ago. His father, Robert Ritchie, said his son worked for a law firm in London before taking a job about 10 years ago at a Dutch pharmaceutical company that had its British headquarters in Reading.
He called him an “absolutely fabulous guy,” whom he loved with all his heart.