GUN COPS RAID KILLER'S HOME:
Raid on flats where killer suspect lived
ONE of the London Bridge terrorists was a “nice guy” who rewarded favours with curry, neighbours claimed yesterday.
Eight hours after the atrocity – which left seven dead – police arrested eight men and four women in a dawn raid at a block of flats where one of the attackers reportedly lived.
One witness said a suspect who tried to flee was shot or Tasered by armed officers.
Others reported hearing gunfire and explosions as police swooped on the address in Barking, east London – 11 miles from the attack scene – at 7am.
Accent
Several men were seen lying face down in the road handcuffed. Four women in fulllength Islamic robes were also led away.
Neighbour Bona Mapianda, 26, who lives opposite, said: “I saw a woman in a burka being put in an ambulance.
“Three men were against the wall and one of them tried to run. He was shot or Tasered by police.”
Officers in overalls were yesterday erecting scaffolding around a ground-floor flat in the apartment block.
Said Mohammad, 52, who lives nearby, said the man who lived in the flat had thanked him with a curry when he had jump-started his car. “I told him to forget about giving me money,” he said. “The next day he turned up with a lovely chicken biryani that we all enjoyed.”
Another neighbour named Jamal said the man was a dad of one in his 20s whose wife was pregnant.
He said: “He had a good connection with children. I always saw him with his child playing in the park.”
Another neighbour added: “You could tell from his accent he was either born here or grew up here but he told me he was from Pakistan.”
Construction worker Seva Litvjakovs, 35, who lives in the block, said hours before the attack he saw the suspected killer wearing the same Arsenal shirt he was pictured in after being shot by police.
He said: “I couldn’t believe it. I had seen him in that shirt at 5pm that evening.
Another neighbour said: “He approached me yesterday and
asked me where I hired a van recently. He said he needed one as he was going to move house.
“He was acting strange yesterday. He was being nicer than normal. He would always chat and was very friendly. Last week he invited me to a barbecue. He was always a very sociable person.
“I knew he lectured people on the Koran and there were always people dressed in robes coming in and out of his apartment.
“He was always nice, but yesterday he was an entirely different level of niceness.”
The suspect had been reportedly thrown out of a mosque two years ago after shouting that voting in a General Election was “un-Islamic”, according to a spokesman.
Escape
“He had no special friends here. He would arrive, pray and then leave,” he said. “He seemed an uneducated person with no knowledge of religion.”
A second raid took place on Barking Road, East Ham, at 3.30pm yesterday at a flat above a Paddy Power bookmakers.
One man tried to escape by climbing out of a window barefoot and in pyjamas.
The man, said to be black and in his 20s, was taken away in a police van along with another man.
Last night attack victims told how they cheated death.
An Australian called Andrew posted a video online of him holding a bloodied gauze pad to his throat as he describes how he was stabbed after watching the Champions League Final at Belushi’s bar.
He said: “I walked across the road and a fight breaks out and I'm like: “S*** what’s going on?
“All of a sudden a guy comes up to me with a knife, stabs me, and I push him off, blood is going everywhere.” Fellow Australian Candice Hedge reportedly can no longer speak after her throat was slashed.
The 31-year-old waitress was attacked as she sat in a bar having a drink after work.
She posted on Facebook: “Hey everyone, just so you know I’m doing OK. Bit of pain but I will survive. Thanks for your thoughts and well wishes.”
Student nurse Rhiannon Owen, 19, told how she ran for her life after coming face-toface with one of the terrorists.
“A taxi driver swerved towards me and screamed at me to run,” she said. “I ran into this pub and people were shouting to get upstairs.
The mum of victim Daniel O’Neill, who was last night being treated in hospital, said one of the terrorists shouted: “This is for Islam” before stabbing her son.
Mum Elizabeth said: “A man ran up and said: ‘This is for my family, this is for Islam’, and stuck a knife straight in him.”