London Bridge terrorists had taken steroids

The London Bridge and Borough Market terror attackers who killed eight people had taken large amounts of steroids, a court heard yesterday.

Khuram Butt, 27, Rachid Redouane, 30, and Youssef Zaghba, 22, all from east London, ploughed into pedestrians in a white van on the bridge. They then stabbed victims in the nearby market with 12-inch knives on June 3 last year.

Jonathan hough QC told a pre-inquest hearing at the Old Bailey that a toxicologist would be required for the inquest to prepare a report on the potential steroid use of the attackers.

he said: ‘Analysis of samples taken from the attackers revealed the presence of DheA, a steroid hormone, above the acceptable physiological range in each of the attackers.

‘ These findings suggest use of the steroid DheA recently prior to death i.e.

Shot dead at the scene

in a period ranging from several hours to days before death. A suitable expert has been instructed to prepare a report on the implications of these findings.’

The attack lasted from 10.07 to 10.16pm when the attackers, who killed eight people and injured 48, were shot dead at the scene by police.

Canadian Christine Archibald, 30, and Frenchmen Xavier Thomas, 45, died as a result of the van attack and Alexandre Pigeard, 26, Sara Zelenak, 21, Kirsty Boden, 28, Sebastien Belanger, 36, James McMullan, 32, and Ignacio echeverria, 39, died as a result of the knife attack.

The Chief Coroner of england and Wales Mark Lucraft QC, decided two separate inquests would be carried out in 2019 – one to decide on the deaths of the victims and a second for the attackers. A jury will sit at the inquest into the death of the terrorists as they died at the hands of police – which is required even if there is no basis for thinking any officer did anything wrong.