CPS News Brief

Ahmed Faraz sentenced to three years for distributing publications designed to encourage terrorism

Ahmed Faraz was sentenced today to three years’ imprisonment at Kingston Crown Court for intentionally distributing publications in order to encourage terrorism, and the possession of material likely to be of use to terrorists.

CPS prosecutor Mark Topping said:

“The charges relate to Ahmed Faraz's activities at the Maktabah bookshop in Birmingham which produced and distributed books, DVDs, and other material designed to encourage terrorist acts. The publications contain highly selective sections of Islamist writing together with material praising Osama Bin Laden and al-Qaeda.

“Owning the books themselves is not a crime, but selling them with a view to encouraging acts of terrorism is. This case is not about banning books. The issue is whether criminal offences are being encouraged.

“It is significant that many of those convicted of the most serious terrorist offences in this country in recent years were in possession of publications produced and distributed by Ahmed Faraz.

“Faraz did not only distribute material. The jury found that he possessed other material, including the al-Qaeda training manual and other electronic documents about IEDs and weapons, which were of a kind likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism.”

CPS statement on Bilal Ahmad

Moira Macmillan, senior lawyer in the CPS Special Crime and Counter Terrorism Division said:

“The sentencing of Bilal Ahmad today sends a warning to people who would seek to encourage violent extremism or to stir up hatred on the internet.

“People are entitled to express their views on the internet and elsewhere. The law seeks to protect the right of all to freedom of speech as is necessary in a democratic society. However, Bilal Ahmad crossed the line from expressing views which some might find unwelcome into serious criminal behaviour, going far beyond what the law allows.

“He was charged with soliciting to murder members of the UK Parliament after he posted an article on a website following the conviction in November 2010 of Roshonara Choudhry for the attempted murder of MP Stephen Timms.

"In this article, Bilal Ahmad encouraged others to follow her example. This is a serious offence which strikes at the heart of our democratic society and once I was satisfied the evidence was there, the public interest clearly required a prosecution. Bilal Ahmad was also charged with publishing material intending to stir up religious hatred; this is the first successful prosecution for this offence.

“A thorough investigation by West Midlands Police meant that when he was confronted with the evidence, Bilal Ahmad entered guilty pleas to five offences. These pleas took into account the range of his criminal behaviour.”

CPS Update - Wednesday 9 March

TERENCE ROY BROWN – CONVICTED TODAY OF TERRORISM OFFENCES AT WINCHESTER CROWN COURT

Attributed to Moira Macmillan, CPS Counter Terrorism Division lawyer:

Terence Brown made money from producing and selling CD Roms which contained details of step-by-step instructions that could be used by anyone planning or committing a terrorist attack.

He has stated throughout that he has no terrorist sympathies and was simply making a living by gathering together information that was already available on the internet, charging for pulling it together and sending it out on disc.

The law is clear that it is a crime to gather this information without a reasonable excuse or to disseminate material which is clearly intended to be of use to terrorists. A person’s intentions or motivation for doing this is irrelevant. What is significant is the fact you have this material in your possession, or distribute it, and that it can be useful to someone with a terrorist purpose.

Although Brown called his collection The Anarchist Cookbook, it is not the same as the book published in America in the 1970s in protest against American involvement in Vietnam. While Brown used the same title, what he collected and sold had very different content and was on a very different scale – if printed out it would run to tens of thousands of pages – and included hundreds of instructions on making bombs, explosives and poisons such as Ricin.

By their guilty verdicts today, the jury has shown that they do not believe that Brown’s explanation for his actions were reasonable.

Airline worker found guilty of terrorism offences

Rajib Karim, a software engineer for British Airways (BA), was found guilty today at Woolwich Crown Court of involvement in preparing a “chilling plan” to blow up a passenger plane. Colin Gibbs, counter terrorism lawyer for the CPS, said:

“Rajib Karim’s deep determination to plan terror attacks whatever the cost was frightening.

“Since his arrival in the UK in 2006, he was keen to be on the frontline of terrorism activities working on behalf of the proscribed organisation Jammat-ul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB). A year later, he found a position as a software engineer for BA, which the prosecution said he considered the perfect job, giving an opportunity sooner or later to fulfil his deadly objective.”

The jury heard how in one of his encrypted communications Karim had said:

“From the moment I entered this country my niyah (purpose) was to do something for the deen (for the faith), it was not to make a living here and start enjoying life. I got the BA job against all odds and really felt it was help from Allah.”

Mr Gibbs said:

“His agenda led him to get in touch in late 2009 with Anwar al- Awlaki, an extremist cleric, based in Yemen who supported the killing of innocent people. As you would expect, it did not take long for the cleric to contact the defendant when he heard that Rajib Karim was a BA employee.”

As a computer expert, Karim had put layers of sophisticated software in place on his computer designed to conceal all his correspondence with his brother and al-Awlaki. Mr Gibbs said:

“This correspondence was recovered after a thorough forensic analysis by the police.

“It revealed that Karim had clearly upped his game. The evidence showed that he was plotting with the cleric to use his job at BA to kill hundreds of innocent people. They also discussed his potential to sabotage BA servers to cause disruption to flights, which would have resulted in a major financial loss.

“The most chilling element of this case is probably the fact that Karim tried to enrol as cabin crew and anyone can imagine how horrific the consequences of this could have been, had he succeeded.

“Rajib Karim had already accepted that he had been involved in terrorist activities as he pleaded guilty before the trial started to charges that relate to the production of a video for a terrorist organisation; fundraising; and offering himself and encouraging others to volunteer for terrorist operations abroad as well as possession of a document containing details of the manufacture of constituent parts of improvised explosive devices.

“It was our task to show to the jury the deeper extent to which he had been involved in such activity and that he only stayed in this country in order to commit an act of terrorism.

“This prosecution shows that the CPS is committed to prosecuting to the full extent of the law those who would use terror to try and achieve their aims - whatever their motivation and the perceived justification.”

• Rajib Karim was found guilty of four counts of engaging in conduct in preparation of terrorists acts, contrary to section 5 (1) of the Terrorism Act 2006. He pleaded guilty before the trial to an offence of fund-raising for the purposes of terrorism (section 15(3) Terrorism Act 2000), possessing a record of information likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism (section 58(1)(b) Terrorism Act 2000) and three further offences of engaging in conduct in preparation of terrorist acts.