Three Muslim men who poured petrol through the letterbox of a publisher who they had heard was printing a controversial book about the Prophet Muhammed were today each jailed for four and a half years.
Ali Beheshti, Abrar Mirza and Abbas Taj planned to set fire to Gibson Square Books after discovering it was going to publish The Jewel of Medina, a book about the Prophet and his young wife.
Beheshti and Mirza poured diesel through the door of the Islington-based company and set it alight. They were arrested by armed Met Police officers as they attempted to flee the scene.
Beheshti, 41, of Tavistock Gardens, Ilford, and Mirza, 23, of East Field Road, Walthamstow, admitted conspiracy to commit arson, being reckless as to whether life was endangered, at an earlier hearing on April 21.
A third man, Abbas Taj, 31, a minicab chauffeur who was driving the getaway car, pleaded not guilty to the same charge, but was found guilty by a jury after a trial at Croydon Crown Court on May 15. Today each was sentenced to four and a half years in prison.
Deputy Assistant Commissioner John McDowall, head of the Met’s Counter Terrorism Command and Senior National Co-ordinator Counter Terrorism, said afterwards that photographs, tapes and documents found at their homes had shown the “violent mindset” of the trio.
“They did not care whether anybody would be killed or injured when they poured diesel through the letterbox and set fire to it,” he said.
He praised the “professional, proactive” police investigation which he said had left Beheshti and Mirza with no choice but to admit their guilt when faced with overwhelming evidence.
“Abbas Taj denied being a part of the conspiracy, claiming he was an innocent party who was merely giving his friends a lift. But the jury saw through his lies and convicted him,” Mr McDowall added
The court heard that Beheshti and Mirza were seen carrying out reconnaissance ‘drive throughs’ of Lonsdale Square and its surrounding area in the weeks leading up to the attack. Beheshti was also caught on CCTV filling a fuel can with diesel. He later put the can into the boot of Taj’s car, which again was caught on CCTV cameras.
The three defendants were seen meeting and driving around before the attack in the early hours of September 27 last year, said police. Beheshti changed his clothes in an attempt to disguise himself.
Taj, of Field Road, Forest Gate, dropped Beheshti and Mirza close to the property just before the attack. He was to be their getaway driver, but was stopped in his car and arrested by armed police near Angel tube station, just after they had set fire to the premises.
Detectives found a computer at Mirza’s address which had been used to research Gibson Square Books, including a Google Earth Plus map search. The computer had been cleaned to prevent some material being recovered.
Photographs were found on a computer at Beheshti’s home of him holding a burning cross at a protest outside the US Embassy in May 2005. Beheshti suffered burns to his hands during the protest. Other pictures showed him posing with a gun and a large sword.
Taj’s car was found to have Jihadi tape recordings in it, as well as mobile phones belonging to Mirza which contained photographs that Mirza had taken on a previous reconnaissance of Lonsdale Square on 9 September 2008.