A man who planned to bomb a railway line with a device made from fairy lights and a pressure cooker has been jailed for life.<\/p>\n
Zahid Hussain, 29, from Birmingham, filled the appliance with 1.6kg of shrapnel and made “improvised igniters” from the festive decorations.<\/p>\n
Hussain became radicalised reading books and websites in his bedroom.<\/p>\n
He was convicted of preparing for an act of terrorism in May and sentenced at Winchester Crown Court on Monday.<\/p>\n
His trial was told he wrongly believed his non-viable pressure cooker “bomb” was capable of causing devastation.<\/p>\n
In the days running up to his arrest, in August 2015, Hussain had made repeated visits to a section of the West Coast Main Line, which the prosecution said was to research a possible attack.<\/p>\n
Following his arrest books on guerrilla warfare were also discovered, including one which talked of mounting attacks on railways.<\/p>\n
His computer showed he had an interest in so-called Islamic State and events in Syria.<\/p>\n
Sentencing “dangerous” Hussain, Mr Justice Sweeney said that had his device been viable, it would have been capable of causing a “significant explosion”.<\/p>\n
The judge concluded that on the evidence and reports of several expert psychiatric reports, Hussain had – during the time of the offence – and still did, suffer with paranoid schizophrenia.<\/p>\n
The judge said a life sentence was “appropriate” in view of “the level of the danger that you pose, and the impossibility of predicting when it will come to an end”.<\/p>\n
Hussain will serve a minimum of 15 years.<\/p>\n
Source: bbc.co.uk<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"