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Trio appear in court over alleged beheading plot Three men planned Isis-inspired public beheading, court hears
(about 2 hours later)
Three men who were arrested earlier this month have appeared in court over an alleged beheading plot. Three men were preparing a terrorist plot to behead a member of the public, inspired by the propaganda of Islamic State militants, a court has heard .
Nadir Ali Sayed, 21, from Hounslow, west London, Yousaf Shah Syed, 19, from High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, and Haseeb Hamayoon, 27, from Hayes, west London, were accused of planning acts of terrorism. The men were arrested a fortnight ago, shortly before Remembrance Sunday, and were preparing to carry out an imminent plan to decapitate a person with knives, Westminster magistrates court was told on Thursday.
The trio, who were detained in a series of raids three days before Remembrance Sunday, were charged on Thursday by the Metropolitan police and appeared at Westminster magistrates court. They were remanded in custody after a 25-minute hearing and are due to appear at the Old Bailey on 4 December. There were no applications for bail. Nadir Ali Sayed, 21, from Hounslow, west London, Yousaf Shah Syed, 19, from High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, and Haseeb Hamayoon, 27, from Hayes, west London, are accused of planning acts of terrorism.
Sayed and Syed appeared to laugh at one point during the hearing. Rebecca Mundy, prosecuting, said: “This appears to be an incident where there was an attack planned in the UK that is imminent in nature and would have involved them beheading a member of the public, using knives to do so.”
All three are accused of “with the intention of committing acts of terrorism”, being “jointly engaged in conduct in preparation for giving effect to their intention, contrary to section 5(1) of the Terrorism Act 2006”. She said the three men were influenced in their plans by a speech from Islamic State spokesperson Abu-Mohammad al-Adnani, calling for attacks on “disbelievers”.
A fourth man arrested in Uxbridge was released on 15 November with no further action. They were charged on Thursday with terrorism offences and appeared in court for the first time. The men, who wore long grey tops, made no application for bail.
The formal charge against them is: “On or before 6 November 2014, with the intention of committing acts of terrorism, jointly engaged in conduct in preparation for giving effect to their intention.”
The men were remanded in custody by district judge Michael Snow to appear at the Old Bailey on 4 December.
The arrests of the three men were made on the evening of 6 November. Police said armed officers had been sent to make the arrests, but no shots were fired.
A fourth man arrested by counter-terrorism detectives on 7 November was released without charge after eight days in custody.
The arrests led to specialist search officers combing through addresses in west London and High Wycombe.
The operation that led to the arrests involved detectives from the Metropolitan police’s counter terrorism command, the south-east counter terrorism unit and MI5.
In recent months the UK has moved to a heightened state of terror alert.
The fear of a terrorist attack being carried out by people with connections to Syria or Iraq, or inspired by Islamic State, led to the joint terrorism analysis centre recommending raising the terrorist threat level in August to severe.
This is the second highest level, meaning that an attack is assessed to be highly likely.