Teenage fanatic jailed for life

A teenager from Essex has been sentenced to life behind bars for plotting a terror attack on British police officers or soldiers in east London.

Islamic State fanatic Matthew King will serve a minimum of 6 years after pleading guilty to the preparation of terrorist acts between December 2021 and May 2022.

The 19 year old expressed a desire to kill military personnel as he prepared to stake out a British Army barracks in Stratford, east London.

He discussed his plans and shared a "gory fantasy" with an online girlfriend with whom he struck up an adolescent flirtation, the Old Bailey heard.

However his plans were disrupted when his mother reported him to the Prevent counter-terrorism programme.

Authorities were also tipped off through an anti-terrorist hotline after he posted a video on a WhatsApp group on April 13th 2022.

In January, King, from Wickford in Essex, pleaded guilty to preparation of terrorist acts between December 22 2021 and May 17 2022. He was handed a discretionary life sentence with a minimum term of six years in the first terrorism sentencing in England and Wales to be televised.

Judge Mark Lucraft KC praised King's mother, saying:

"She took the very bold step of alerting Prevent when she had concerns for her son. That cannot have been an easy thing to do in the first place and in my view she absolutely the right thing."

Commander Dominic Murphy, who leads the Met’s Counter Terrorism Command, said:

"King was a committed, self-initiated terrorist who we believe was close to carrying out an attack. He will now spend a long time in jail, where he doesn’t pose a risk to the public.

“It is notable that this investigation started as a direct result of calls to police from members of the public who were concerned about King’s extremist mindset, and this case is a powerful example of how vitally important information from the public is to counter-terrorism investigations.

“The speed at which King self-radicalised and then began to start planning an attack was alarming, and the calls made to us from members of the public about King led directly to police stopping him committing a deadly attack.

“This case shows that people can and should have confidence in reporting concerns linked to terrorism to us – those calls really do make a difference, and police will act on the information to keep people safe.

“I would like to commend the work of the investigation team, who built the strong foundations of the case in the two weeks after his arrest, and worked in challenging circumstances to secure the evidence needed to charge King and ensure he remained in custody from the time of his arrest.”

First for all the latest news from across the UK every hour on Hits Radio on DAB, at hitsradio.co.uk and on the Rayo app.