'Secret' terror trial: Law student Erol Incedal guilty of having bomb-making blueprint

 
Trial: Erol Incedal (Picture: PA)
Paul Cheston17 November 2014
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Law student Erol Incedal was found guilty in the secret terror trial of possessing a bomb making document on a memory card, it can now be reported.

But the Old Bailey jury was discharged after it failed to reach a verdict on another charge of preparing an act of terrorism with others abroad.

A provisional retrial date of February 23 next year was set at a hearing before Mr Justice Nicol today.

The court had heard that the 26-year-old Londoner was arrested on October 13 last year in his car near London Bridge.

Police had bugged his black Mercedes for a fortnight after he was stopped for speeding on September 30 2013.

A micro SD memory card containing the bomb-making document and another file on car bombs was found tucked into the cover of his iPhone.

The court heard that it contained instructions for a viable device.

Incedal admitted possessing the document and that it was of use to someone preparing an act of terrorism but claimed he had a “reasonable excuse” for having it.

He also denied preparing an act of terrorism with others by targeting individuals, such as former prime minister Tony Blair, or a wide-ranging Mumbai-style attack.

His co-defendant, Mounir Rarmoul-Bouhadjar, 26, pleaded guilty before the trial started to having an identical document.

The jury deliberated its verdicts for 23 hours and 35 minutes and found Turkish-born Incedal guilty of possessing the terrorist document but could not reach a verdict on the other count on November 11.

The details could only be reported today after trial judge Mr Justice Nicol lifted restrictions. The new trial is due to go on for four to five weeks.

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