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Plans land teen in trouble
26/09/2007 19:51 - (SA)
London - A teenage Muslim was found guilty by a London court Wednesday of illegally having a manual detailing how to make home-made bombs and was warned he could face jail.
The manual - said by prosecutors to be a "step by step guide to the manufacture and production of viable, improvised explosive devices" - was found at the family home of Abdul Patel's wife in a police raid in August 2006.
Patel, 18, from London, was also said to have had close links to an alleged Islamist extremist.
A jury at London's Central Criminal Court convicted him of having a document "likely to be useful for an act of terrorism". He was cleared of an alternative charge of having a document "for an act of terrorism".
Judge Peter Rook told Patel he was keeping "all options open" for sentencing, which would take place on October 26. Patel was released in the meantime on conditional bail.
Prosecutor Peter Wright had told the jury that Patel was "part of a web of radicalised young Muslim men in which his possession of the explosives manual was not innocent.
Entirely deliberate
"It was entirely deliberate. It was available for use if called upon. It was in the custody of a young man who was ready, willing and able to assist in a cause he believed in."
He added: "In the wrong hands, the information contained in this manual can have catastrophic consequences - including causing explosions of the most terrifying kind in the UK and abroad."
Patel denied being an Islamist extremist and claimed in his defence that the manual was in one of two boxes that had been left in the house by a man known to his father.
He said he had asked the man to take the boxes away after discovering their contents. Also in one of the boxes was a CD labelled Love Songs containing an Islamist address apparently aimed at US military personnel.
It said: "We promise you we will not let you live safely. Our mujahideen are coming to you very soon to let you see what you did not see before."
There were also images of the September 11, 2001 attacks in New York and some of the hijackers who took part.
There were also details on the Afghan war and a computer disk with recipes in Arabic for poison such as sarin and cyanide but Patel said they belonged to his father.
- AFP
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