FOUR MEN who failed in an attempt to cause death and destruction on the streets of London just weeks after the 7/7 attacks have been imprisoned for life.
Muktar Ibrahim, 29, Yassin Omar, 26, Ramzi Mohammed, 25, and Hussain Osman, 28, were found guilty at Woolwich Crown Court of conspiracy to murder on Monday.
Two other men – Manfo Kwaku Asiedu, 34, and Adel Yahya, 24 – face a retrial over the bombings after a first jury failed to reach a verdict.
All four had unsuccessfully tried to detonate home-made bombs on three tubes and one bus in central London on 21st July 2005 – just two weeks after the 7/7 attacks which killed 52 people.
The jury heard how the capital was still coming to terms with the destruction of the 7/7 bombs just two weeks earlier when the men tried to bring horror on the streets of London.
They attempted to detonate hydrogen peroxide and chapatti flour bombs covered in shrapnel on three tubes and one bus, but the devices failed to detonate properly.
The men fled and were captured on CCTV as police launched a manhunt to find them.
In court the four defendants claimed the bombs were fake and their actions were intended as a protest against the Iraq war.
But the jury was told Omar’s eighth-floor flat in New Southgate, north London, was turned into a bomb factory.
The men, armed with their home-made bombs in rucksacks, converged on central London on 21 July.
Mohammed attempted to detonate his bomb at Oval Station, Omar on a train at Warren Street, Osman on a Hammersmith and City line service to Shepherds Bush and Ibrahim on a bus in Shoreditch, east London.
When the devices failed to detonate, the men fled. The jury was told had the attacks not failed there would have been a considerable number of fatalities.
As the defendants fled each were captured on CCTV camera’s and police launched a massive manhunt.
Police found a suicide note left by one of the plotters, Mohammed, addressed to his girlfriend and two children in which he told them to “rejoice in happiness”.
He was captured a week later with Ibrahim after police surrounded a flat in west London.
Omar was arrested in Birmingham after travelling there disguised as a woman in a burka, while Osman was detained in Rome and extradited back to Britain.
Nigel Sweeney QC, prosecutor, told jurors the defendants had planned the attack long before 7/7 and was not a “hastily-arranged copycat” operation.
Mr Sweeney said: “The failure of those bombs to explode owed nothing to the intention of these defendants, rather it was simply the good fortune of the travelling public that day that they were spared.”
