Reading stabbings: Man motivated by ‘religious jihad’

From the BBC and Sky News

A man who stabbed three people to death in a Reading park believed he was carrying out “an act of religious jihad”, a court has heard.

Khairi Saadallah, 26, stabbed to death James Furlong, 36, David Wails, 49, and Joseph Ritchie-Bennett, 39, during the attack in Forbury Gardens in June.

As part of his sentencing, a hearing will decide if he was motivated by a religious or ideological cause. The prosecution claim the stabbing spree was a terror attack. 

Saadallah has admitted three counts of murder and attempted murder, but denies he was motivated by an ideological cause.

Prosecutor Alison Morgan QC told the court he “executed” his victims and intended to “kill as many people as he could” in the name of violent jihad.

She said: “In less than a minute, shouting Allahu Akhbar the defendant carried out a lethal attack with a knife, killing all three men before they had a chance to respond and try to defend themselves. Within the same minute, the defendant went on to attack others nearby, stabbing three more people, Stephen Young, Patrick Edwards and Nishit Nisudan, causing them significant injuries.”

Stating the prosecution’s case she said the attack was “carefully planned and executed” by the defendant with “determination and precision”.

She added: “The defendant believed that in carrying out this attack he was acting in pursuit of his extreme ideology, an ideology he appears to have held for some time. He believed that in killing as many people as possible that day he was performing an act of religious jihad.”

 Old Bailey heard he had served with an outlawed Islamist militia in Libya and had been refused asylum eight years earlier.  Saadallah was refused asylum on 6 December 2012 by which time he was staying in Manchester and absconded after an appeal failed. Eventually, in 2018, he was granted “leave to remain” in the country until 2023. But two criminal convictions the following year prompted a Home Office case review, which decided to deport him.

Saadallah, a Libyan, was not removed from the country because of “legal barriers”, despite a string of criminal convictions. The Manchester arena murderers were Libyan asylum seekers as well. Did they know each other? The Manchester Evening News says police have found no known ‘criminal’ link – but attending the same mosque or study group wouldn’t look ‘criminal’ unless you were aware of what was being studied. 

A sentencing hearing was told that Saadallah served once served a jail term alongside Omar Brooks, a convert also known as Abu Izzadeen. (Real name Trevor, a mate of Anjem Choudary and a very nasty piece of work.) The pair were said to have been in HMP Bullingdon together in January 2017 when they attended Friday prayers and went to the gym together. . . a prison officer at HMP Bullingdon observed that Saadallah was “keen to talk to and associate with” Brooks whilst they were in custody together..

Ms Morgan said Saadallah’s desire to associate with a known extremist in 2017 was “significant” because it “indicates that the extremist ideology that he was exposed to in Libya in 2011 remained of interest to him in 2017, three years before the attacks in this case.”

While in Tripoli, along with his father, he claimed to have been part of a group called Ansar Al-Sharia, an Islamist militia which has been proscribed as a terrorist organisation by the British government. Although images were later found of him with firearms, he claimed he had only “helped wounded people and with delivering weapons and other things to the war fields… plus guarded some hospitals.”

Handwritten notes including the words: “We will be free and carry out Jihad and ask my Lord God that when I hold the arm, tears of joy will come down about the Hoor-al-ayn [the Virgins of Paradise] that will be happily waiting for me,” were found in his Reading flat.