An unemployed “loner” who ploughed a hire van into a group of Muslims after becoming radicalised by far-right material within weeks will be sentenced on Friday.
Darren Osborne, 48, deliberately mowed down worshippers outside two mosques in Finsbury Park, north London, shortly after 12.15am on June 19 last year, killing 51-year-old Makram Ali and injuring 12 others.
A jury of eight women and four men took one hour to convict the father-of-four, who was seen smiling and blowing a kiss to angry bystanders in the moments after the terror attack, of murder and attempted murder.
Osborne, who had denied both charges, will be sentenced at Woolwich Crown Court on Friday morning.
Forensic officers at the scene of the attack (Victoria Jones/PA)
Part way through the trial Osborne, from Glyn Rhosyn in Cardiff, suddenly denied he had been driving the van at the moment of impact, an 11th hour defence the prosecution dismissed as being conjured “out of thin air”.
The attacker said he had no idea Dave – one of his two made-up accomplices – intended to smash into a group of pedestrians, and believed they were on their way to a pub to meet a third co-conspirator, Terry.
Jurors agreed with prosecutors who dubbed his increasingly improbable version of events a “total fabrication” and “frankly absurd”.
During the nine-day trial Osborne told the court he had wanted to kill senior Labour figures including leader Jeremy Corbyn and London Mayor Sadiq Khan.
He had also plotted to murder Rochdale Labour councillor Aftab Hussain but called it off because he wanted “more casualties”.
A note written by Osborne – which complained about terrorism, the Rotherham child sex scandal, and branded Mr Corbyn a “terrorist sympathiser” – was found in the cab of the van.
Osborne, a “total loner”, had become obsessed with Muslims after watching BBC drama Three Girls in May last year and was angered by what he deemed as inaction following a string of UK terror attacks, his estranged partner Sarah Andrews said.
Prosecutors will ask the court to take into account the fact this was a terrorism offence when Osborne is sentenced on Friday.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article