Moroccan pastry chef with a cruel temper
ONE of the London Bridge terrorists paid a final visit to his baby daughter hours before the attack.
Rachid Redouane, 30, went to a housing unit for vulnerable mothers to see his 20-monthold Amina and estranged wife.
Three hours later the Moroccan pastry chef died in a hail of bullets with a fake bomb belt strapped to his waist and an Irish ID card in his pocket.
Last night, Scotland Yard was still piecing together his movements since he arrived in Europe from North Africa.
Redouane was a ‘clean skin’ with no known links to terror. Investigators are understood to be sceptical of his claims to be from Morocco via Libya.
Redouane appears to have gained the right to stay in Britain by marrying London-born Charisse O’Leary, 38, possibly in Dublin. Friends said she travelled to Ireland around three years ago after he moved to the Rathmines area in the south of the city when his visa ran out.
They said Redouane tried to convert her to Islam but she refused and they had a ‘volatile’ relationship. He returned to Britain about nine months ago. On Sunday, Mrs O’Leary, now using his surname, was arrested at gunpoint after the doors to her block of flats were blown off. Witnesses said she shouted ‘don’t shoot’ as she was dragged out sobbing. Her daughter was taken away by social workers.
Neighbour Siobhan Thomson said Redouane lived at the property until ‘two or three months ago’ when they separated, but visited regularly.
‘All the bomb squad came with the dogs and their faces covered on Sunday morning and they broke down her door and she was really, really upset when she was taken out with
the little girl,’ she said. ‘She was injured – it must’ve been injuries from the force of whatever they opened the door with. My door isn’t actually on the hinges any more.’
Another neighbour said Redouane was seen at the block in East London at 6pm on Saturday, four hours before the attack. ‘Armed police officers knocked on my door at 7am and warned me there would be a loud bang – then seconds later it sounded like a bomb had gone off,’ she said.
‘I saw them taking Charisse away – she had blood running down her face because she’d obviously been injured in the blast. She was very upset – sobbing and crying out for her baby. It was extremely upsetting to see them being taken in separate cars.
‘Her ex-boyfriend Rachid used to live with them but moved out a few weeks ago. He did return at 6pm on Saturday because I saw he’d signed in on the visitors’ book but I’m not sure why.
‘Charisse is a lovely woman and wouldn’t harm a fly. Rachid keeps himself to himself and I know he is very religious.’
Mrs O’Leary was released without charge last night. In one CV posted on the internet, she is listed as a personal assistant and former carer. She has posted dozens of pictures of her baby daughter online. But friends said she ‘hated’ her husband whom she accused of beating and bullying her during their turbulent months together.
Just weeks ago, Mrs O’Leary wrote angrily online how he refused to visit Amina, choosing instead to go swimming with friends.
One former colleague at an Essex care home said: ‘There’s no way she’d have been involved [in terror]. She hated him in the end.
‘He was a horrible person. She didn’t say what happened but it seemed to me like it was domestic violence.’
The carer added: ‘She smokes, she drinks. She wouldn’t have converted to Islam. She dressed normally, in Western clothes.’ O’Leary left her full- time job at the care home around two years ago, the woman said. She then travelled to Ireland to be with her husband whose ‘visa had run out’.
‘He was from Morocco or somewhere like that and he’d been sent back,’ the carer added. ‘He went to Ireland while he waited for a visa and she went there because she hadn’t seen him for ages.’
Another friend said Mrs O’Leary would have been ‘ terrified’ when the police came.
‘She’s an absolutely brilliant person and a brilliant mum. She wouldn’t have known [about the plot],’ she said.
In Ireland, security sources confirmed that Redouane lived in the country for two years and left about nine months ago.
He lived in Rathmines which is considered upmarket, but also has a number of older Georgian buildings subdivided into cheap bedsits.
The Irish special detective unit is now investigating his movements and contacts to see if he spent time with other terrorist suspects.
It has not been confirmed what sort of Irish ID card he was carrying but it’s believed it was a Garda National Immigration Bureau card.
All non-nationals who are not citizens of a member state of the European Union, the European Economic Area or Switzerland must register with the Irish police. Speaking in Chicago, Irish leader Enda Kenny said the terrorist killer did not crop up on the intelligence service’s radar.
He said: ‘As I pointed out in public and in the Dáil [parliament] on a number of occasions there are a small number of people in Ireland who are being monitored and observed in respect of radicalisation and matters relevant to that.
‘In this case, these facts are being checked but my understanding is this individual was not a member of that small group.’