Somali student on trial for ‘failing to tell police of bomb plot’

 

A Somali student is facing a possible jail sentence for failing to tell police that a friend was planning a suicide bomb attack on a Bristol shopping centre.

 

Hashi Ahmed Omer, 19, is alleged to have known that Isa Ibrahim, 20, a British Muslim convert, had made himself a suicide bomb vest and intended to blow himself up.

Ibrahim, a former public schoolboy, was jailed for an indefinite period after being convicted of planning the terror attack at Winchester Crown Court in July.

Bristol Crown Court was told yesterday that Ibrahim had confided in Omer after meeting him at a mosque in the city. Omer is charged with failing to disclose a terrorist plot between April 5 and April 18 last year under the Terrorism Act.

The court was told that Ibrahim did extensive internet research before he bought bomb-making ingredients and made a number of improvised suicide vests.

Mark Ellison, QC, for the prosecution, said that the two men met at a mosque in Bristol on 5 April 12 days before Ibrahim was arrested by anti-terror police.

He said: ”What the defendant Mr Omer came to believe to be Ibrahim’s adherence to this ideology between April 5 and 17 is the central plank of the prosecution case together with what he believed Ibrahim might be planning to do in furtherance of it.

“The case against the defendant is that he must have come to believe that he had information about Ibrahim that might be of help to the authorities in preventing an act of terrorism by Ibrahim and it rests on the accumulation of information that came his way in terms of his knowledge of Ibrahim’s extremist mindset.

“Ibrahim confided in him about his extremist views and even that he was making his own suicide belt. He had information that may have prevent Ibrahim from committing an act of terrorism.”

The two men met at a the Al Jazeera mosque in Bristol where Mr Ibrahim was known as as a recent convert to the Muslim faith.

Omer later told police he believed that Ibrahim’s views on Islam were inaccurate and they exchanged telephone numbers after their first meeting so that he could educate him on the faith.

The court was shown closed-circuit television images of the two men together in Bristol city centre. On April 9 the pair went to Boots where Ibrahim bought acetone and nail varnish remover.

The following day they went to Robert Dyas, and later, to Maplin where they purchased bulbs, a battery box and a switch — items that were revealed during Ibrahim’s trial to be meant for use in explosives.

Later that day Ibraham sent a text message to Omer after buying hydrogen peroxide from Boots — another ingredient for his bomb.

The text message said: ”lol (laughs out loud) was listening to nasheed [a song] from a video and some Iraqi guy talks about wiping out an entire American convoy and the damn headphones came out and put it on speaker.” Omer, of St Judes, Bristol, denied the charge at a previous hearing at Nottingham Crown Court.

Wearing a striped shirt and grey jumper and trousers, Omer spoke only to confirm his name at the opening of his trial at Bristol Crown Court yesterday. He is currently on bail on condition that he remains at a specified residence, gives up his passport and does not apply for new travel documents.

The case continues at Bristol Crown Court.

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Source: Times Online