A man who said he wanted to throw a grenade at a police station has been convicted of terror and explosives offences.
Mohammed Chowdhury, 24, was arrested after meeting with an undercover police officer who was posing as an arms dealer at a Costa Coffee branch in London.
Chowdhury paid £300 for what he believed to be a real grenade, but was immediately arrested in a sting by armed police.
He was convicted of attempting to possess an explosive with intent to endanger life or property on Wednesday, following a trial at the Old Bailey.
Chowdhury had previously pleaded guilty to four counts of possessing documents likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism, but was not charged with planning a terror attack himself.
Following his arrest on 5 February, 2020, he made several phone calls to relatives from prison where he told them what he wanted to do with the grenade.
In one call to his mother and sister, he said he wanted “to chuck it in the station area”, adding: “I wanted to do something serious like on the TV.”
Please enter your email address Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP Thanks for signing up to the News newsletter {{#verifyErrors}} {{message}} {{/verifyErrors}} {{^verifyErrors}} {{message}} {{/verifyErrors}} I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the News newsletter {{#verifyErrors}} {{message}} {{/verifyErrors}} {{^verifyErrors}} {{message}} {{/verifyErrors}} I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice
Speaking to his mother in March 2020, he said: “I don’t care about the judge or the police and that. I wanted to hurt one of them, innit. I was getting annoyed. That’s why I went, that’s why I went to get the thingy.”
Chowdhury suggested he could have concealed the grenade in a place where it would have “blown up in their face”, but then added: “If I would have got that I would have chucked it at the station, innit, I don’t care.”
He said he wanted to do “something bad” and told his mother: “I don’t care if I see any legs or anything or someone’s legs coming off. Something like that.”
Prosecutor Alistair Richardson told jurors: “When Mr Chowdhury did try to come into possession of the hand grenade, he was clearly intending to use it to put life in danger or to cause serious damage.”
Chowdhury had previous dealings with the police in November 2019, when he was prosecuted after brandishing an axe outside Stepney Green Underground Station in east London.
UK news in pictures Show all 51 1 /51 UK news in pictures UK news in pictures 3 March 2021 Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rishi Sunak during a press conference in 10 Downing Street, London, following the 2021 Budget in the House of Commons. Picture date: Wednesday March 3, 2021 PA UK news in pictures 2 March 2021 A train rounds the coast and heads towards the Carbis Bay Estate hotel and beach, which is set to be the main venue for the upcoming G7 summit Getty UK news in pictures 1 March 2021 Newborn lambs in a field at A J Thompson & Sons farm on the Romney Marsh near Lydd in Kent on the first day of meteorological spring PA UK news in pictures 28 February 2021 People walking on the beach in Scarborough, North Yorkshire PA UK news in pictures 27 February 2021 The coffin of Captain Tom Moore is being carried members of the Armed Forces at Bedford Crematorium in Bedford EPA UK news in pictures 26 February 2021 A dog stands on rocks as the sun rises behind it at New Brighton beach, Wirral PA UK news in pictures 25 February 2021 Shadow chancellor Anneliese Dodds delivers a pre-Budget speech to the Institute of Global Prosperity at Labour Party headquarters in London PA UK news in pictures 24 February 2021 Britain’s Health Secretary Matt Hancock looks on outside Downing Street in London, Britain REUTERS UK news in pictures 23 February 2021 Two surfers make their way into the sea off of Boscombe beach in Dorset PA UK news in pictures 22 February 2021 Crocuses bloom outside Trinity College in Cambridge PA UK news in pictures 21 February 2021 Street art adorns many of the streets and walls around the Digbeth area of Birmingham PA UK news in pictures 20 February 2021 Parts of Callander in Stirlingshire flooded after the River Teith burst its banks PA UK news in pictures 19 February 2021 The sun rises over St Mary’s Lighthouse, Northumberland PA UK news in pictures 18 February 2021 Cars drive along the A1101 in Welney, Norfolk, which is passable again after two months submerged by floodwater PA UK news in pictures 17 February 2021 Professor Green announces Tideway’s new 25km Super Sewer is ‘Heading East’, marking a major stage in the construction of the tunnel, as two giant Tunnel Boring Machines link up to break through into Bermondsey and commence tunnelling towards East London. Once completed, the sewer system will prevent millions of tonnes of raw sewage entering the Thames PA UK news in pictures 16 February 2021 man holds up signs reading “I LOST MY JOB!!” and “BORIS, WHO IS GOING TO PAY THIS BILL? I DON’T HAVE ANY MONEY TO PAY MY CREDIT CARD” at the window of his hotel room at the Radisson Blu hotel in London Getty UK news in pictures 15 February 2021 Passengers arriving at Heathrow’s Terminal 5 are escorted by security personal to buses. From today, people arriving from 33 “red list” countries, including South Africa and the United Arab Emirates, must isolate in hotels rooms for 10 days at their own expense. The policy was announced late last month in response to the emergence of new variants of the novel coronavirus that are more resistant to existing vaccines. Getty UK news in pictures 14 February 2021 People play ice hockey on frozen flooded fields near Ely in Cambridgeshire PA UK news in pictures 13 February 2021 Prime Minister Boris Johnson, wearing a face mask, accompanied by Sarah Rose (left), MD of the Northumbria healthcare PPE manufacturing hub in Seaton Delaval PA UK news in pictures 12 February 2021 Lanterns hang across the street to celebrate the Chinese Lunar New Year which marks the Year of the Ox, in Chinatown, central London, during England’s third national lockdown to curb the spread of coronavirus. PA UK news in pictures 11 February 2021 European Commission Vice-President Maros Sefcovic at London’s St Pancras Station after arriving in the UK ahead of talks with Cabinet Office Minister Michael Gove on the Northern Ireland protocol. PA UK news in pictures 10 February 2021 A frozen road sign and hedgerow are covered in icicles, as Storm Darcy affects large parts of the country, in Shenley, Hertfordshire Reuters UK news in pictures 9 Februrary 2021 People walk up Gardner street in Glasgow as snow blankets the city AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 8 February 2021 Drifting snow covers a car in Harwood, County Durham PA UK news in pictures 7 February 2021 People walk through the snow in Knole Park in Sevenoaks Getty UK news in pictures 6 February 2021 A boy sledges at Moulin Moor near Pitlochry, as storm Darcy approaches, in Scotland Reuters UK news in pictures 5 February 2021 Research centre assistant Layla Hillsden with a rare copy of the 1647 Beaumont and Fletcher folio, an anthology of plays by John Fletcher and William Beaumont, from the personal library of King Charles II that has recently been acquired by Special Collections at the University of Leeds PA UK news in pictures 4 February 2021 Al Goodridge, from Newtonmore, uses an axe to create a channel in the ice for his wife Alice to swim in in Loch Insh, in the Cairngorms National Park PA UK news in pictures 3 February 2021 A mural of Captain Sir Tom Moore, by artist Robert Newbiggin, adorns a wall in Southport. The WWII veteran raised nearly £33 million for NHS charities ahead of his 100th birthday last year by walking laps of his garden in Marston Moretaine, Bedfordshire. He was admitted to Bedford Hospital this weekend after testing positive for Covid-19 and died yesterday with his family present Getty UK news in pictures 2 February 2021 Police officers remove an environmental activist protesting against the HS2 high speed rail line, from the roof of the HS2 office in central London on February 2, 2021. – Designed to run to the former industrial powerhouse Birmingham and then Manchester and Leeds, HS2 was supposed to follow on from London’s southern Eurostar connection with Paris AFP via Getty Images UK news in pictures 1 February 2021 Christine Barry lifts her son Oran, two, up to kiss a statue of St Brigid as they visit St Brigid’s holy well in Co Kildare to mark St Brigid’s Day which is seen by many in Ireland as the first day of Spring PA UK news in pictures 31 January 2021 People walk a dog in Pugneys Country Park in Wakefield, West Yorkshire PA UK news in pictures 30 January 2021 Firefighters inspect the charred remains of a block at Napier Barracks after police have said a fire was started deliberately in Folkestone, England. Napier Barracks, part of the disused Somerset House Sir John Moore Army Barracks, has been used since last summer to house Asylum Seekers arriving from France to the South Coast. It has been reported that 120 of the 400 people being housed there have caught Coronavirus and a visiting doctor had described the living conditions as “inhumane” Getty UK news in pictures 29 January 2021 Members of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community take part in Friday prayers at the Baitus Subhan Mosque in Croydon, England. For nearly the past year, the Covid-19 pandemic, and its resulting limits on public gatherings, have forced religious communities to find new ways to observe prayers, with many events being marked at home. Mosques as well as other places of religious worship remain open, though numbers have been limited to help maintain social distancing Getty UK news in pictures 28 January 2021 Artwork depicting animals, created by Raymond and Leonard is displayed in the window of a house in Acton, London, to launch The Great Big Art Exhibition, the nation’s largest ever exhibition, an initiative by Firstsite PA UK news in pictures 27 January 2021 Fishing boats, some abandoned, lie in the waters of the River Wyre at Fleetwood in Lancashire PA UK news in pictures 26 January 2021 A group of friends use a sheet to sledge in the snow-covered Lickey Hills Country Park, Birmingham PA UK news in pictures 25 January 2021 A cyclist watches the sun rise from Primrose Hill PA UK news in pictures 24 Janaury 2021 People go sledging in the snow on Parliament Hill on Hampstead Heath Getty UK news in pictures 23 January 2021 Denise Munday (left) and Ruth Richards (right) check on Ruth’s rescued ex-battery hens, in flood water at her home near Naburn Lock in York following heavy rain during Storm Christoph PA UK news in pictures 22 January 2021 The clean up as floodwater begins to recede from the town of Northwich, Cheshire, in the aftermath of Storm Christoph Getty UK news in pictures 21 January 2021 Members of the Emergency services work to evacuate Care Home residents after they became stranded by flood water, in Northwich, northwest England as Storm Christoph brings heavy rains and flooding across England AFP via Getty UK news in pictures 20 January 2021 Flooding underneath the A46 at Six Hills Lane in Leicestershire, as Storm Christoph is set to bring widespread flooding, gales and snow to parts of the UK PA UK news in pictures 19 January 2021 A surfer rides a wave in the sea off of Boscombe beach in Dorset PA UK news in pictures 18 January 2021 British Prime Minister Boris Johnson stands outside a room where technicians are manufacturing the AstraZeneca covid-19 vaccine at Oxford Biomedica, in Oxford Reuters UK news in pictures 17 January 2021 People on the sea front in Brighton during England’s third national lockdown to curb the spread of coronavirus PA UK news in pictures 16 January 2021 Cubicles erected inside Salisbury Cathedral, Wiltshire, for people to receive an injection of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine PA UK news in pictures 15 January 2021 Vehicles negotiate a flooded road in Mountsorrel, Leciestershire, with a large swathe of England covered by 30 flood warnings by lunchtime Friday PA UK news in pictures 14 January 2021 NHS workers from hospitals across the capital during a socially distanced protest outside Downing Street, London, timed to coincide with the weekly clap for heroes PA UK news in pictures 13 January 2021 A public health notice to ‘stay home’ at a bus stop in London EPA UK news in pictures 12 January 2021 The sun rises behind Scarborough Castle in Yorkshire PA
The court heard that he had been pushed by a man and returned with the weapon, waving it around.
Chowdhury was given a suspended prison sentence, which he breached by trying to buy the grenade.
Having been caught on CCTV for the axe incident, Chowdhury appeared to direct his rage against the police. The Old Bailey heard the likely target for his grenade attack was Bethnal Green police station.
In a search of his flat, police recovered a “shopping list” including handcuffs, nitrite gloves, and strong acid.
Chowdhury appeared to have attempted to buy a balaclava, lock picks, a stun gun and a handgun online, jurors heard.
In a note saved on his mobile phone, he had written about wanting his family dead, “feeling homicidal” and attacking students in a college.
“I feel I want to commit mass murder and kill myself before the police get a chance to arrest me,” Chowdhury wrote.
An examination of the device indicated that he had downloaded information on making explosives, including terrorist documents.
Chowdhury had also searched the internet for terms including IED, pipebomb and the phrase “let’s make a bomb”.
Commander Richard Smith, head of the Metropolitan Police Counter Terrorism Command said: “Chowdhury downloaded a number of extremely concerning documents and manuals, containing details of how to create and deploy explosives and lethal weapons. What’s more, he then made very serious attempts at trying to get hold of a hand grenade.
“These are extremely serious offences and the public are undoubtedly safer following this investigation and outcome.
“This case is a reminder to everyone that the threat from terrorism remains and I want to remind the public that their continued vigilance and support is needed.”
Chowdhury will be sentenced on 23 March.
