Fake suicide jacket that nailed No10 terror plotter
AN ISLAMIC State terrorist who was handed a dummy suicide bomb by undercover police faced life in prison last night.
Naa’imur Rahman, 20, wanted to blow up the gates of Downing Street before beheading Theresa May, a court heard.
The would-be lone wolf attacker wanted revenge in a ‘full frontal assault’ after his extremist uncle was killed in a drone strike on the Syrian frontline.
But he was arrested moments after a Scotland Yard officer posing as an Islamist armourer handed him a coat laden with explosives.
It was the first time British police had adopted US-style tactics in an operation to catch a dangerous fanatic red-handed.
Experts constructed a highly realistic suicide vest and rucksack bomb as Rahman dreamed he was just ‘days away’ from wreaking carnage. After an Old Bailey jury convicted the jihadist of preparing acts of terrorism, it can be revealed that:
He was inspired by extremist YouTube preachers and used the site to study a bomb-making video and research his targets;
He simply walked away from the Prevent programme despite being the fourth member of his family linked to terrorism;
Police used a drone to keep Rahman under surveillance as he walked off with the supposedly deadly weapons;
He was brought to justice by chance after he was arrested for sending naked images of himself to an underage girl on Instagram.
The aspiring terrorist was inspired by an uncle fighting for IS, who sent him bomb-making Lone wolf: Naa’imur Rahman instructions and told him to ‘take a gun into Waitrose and shoot people’.
But when his relative was killed in an airstrike last June, the jihadist went in search of another Islamist mentor on Instagram. Instead, he met an undercover FBI officer posing as an extremist fixer, who passed him on to MI5.
During conversations on an encrypted messaging app, Rahman revealed how he wanted to arm himself with a knife, pepper spray and gun as part of a ‘sleeper cell’.
And he asked for his contact to help him obtain bombs to claim as many lives as possible.
He told the undercover officer: ‘[God willing it] will be very big if I’m successful. I can’t mess up. I can’t get [martyrdom] if I get caught.’
In a ground-breaking operation, British security officials decided to provide him with mock devices to prove his deadly intent was genuine. The undercover officer met Rahman to collect a jacket before returning it supposedly packed with two slabs of explosives linked to a battery and trigger. After being told it was more powerful than the Manchester Arena bombing, he replied: ‘ Now I’ve seen everything – it feels good.’
Rahman believed he was just ‘days away’ from his attack but he was arrested moments after collecting the devices.
Deputy Assistant Commissioner Dean Haydon, who leads Scotland Yard’s counter-terrorism command, said Rahman wanted to ‘kill, injure and maim’.
Rahman, from Finchley, North London, also admitted helping a friend join Islamic State by recording a sponsorship video.
He will be sentenced at a later date. The jury is continuing to consider a charge against a second defendant.