The Guardian reports that the 17-year-old who was arrested for planning an attack on a Justin Bieber concert in the UK has been sentenced to life in prison.
Lloyd Gunton was found guilty of plotting to attack the show despite a defense that insisted the teen was simply curious about how easy it would be to look up information on terrorism online. However, because he’d been discovered with weapons and apparently written a “martyrdom” letter, jurors were not inclined to let him off the hook.
While he claimed he had a “stupid interest in the gory” but no interest in actually carrying out the attack, the letter itself included bullet points like “run down the non-believers with a car” and “strike the infidels who oppose Allah in the neck”. The police found a bag in Gunton’s room with a claw hammer and a knife, which he apparently intended to use to carry out the attack.
“I wanted to see how easy it was for people who had an interest in terrorism to go online and get information, because the police and the government are trying to crack down on terrorism and radicalization,” he said, “I wanted to see if it was possible, not for me, but from someone else’s point of view.”
However, the judge, Mark Wall QC, had a firm retort in store for Gunton, saying, “The police found a rucksack in your room which contained a knife, a hammer and what has been referred to as a suicide note or a martyrdom letter. In the martyrdom letter you referred to yourself as a ‘soldier of Isis’. The letter was written in such terms that it was obviously to be found and read after you had carried out a terrorist attack… I am sure that you planned not just the killing of one person but rather mass murder. In my judgment I must pass an indeterminate sentence. Your actions show a total disregard for human life. I cannot foresee a time when I can be confident that your danger will have ended or decreased sufficiently to enable me to pass a determinate or extended sentence.”
