A teenage would-be terrorist “ruthlessly exploited” an impressionable young man in a plot to carry out a Lee Rigby copycat killing, a court has heard.
Kazi Islam, 18, is accused of grooming 19-year-old Harry Thomas with a combination of “flattery and threats” to buy the ingredients for a pipe bomb and to attack one or more soldiers with a knife.
A series of exchanges on BlackBerry Messenger and social media sites were uncovered when police raided the house in east London where Islam lived with his family, jurors were told. Prosecutor Annabel Darlow QC said Islam had befriended Thomas in October 2013 by pretending to sympathise with him over a break-up with a girlfriend. He went on to incite Thomas to kill a soldier with stories of innocent children being murdered by military forces and even suggested he start calling himself Haroon rather than Harry. Islam denies the charges.
