One of the UK’s most senior police officers has called for a review of why UK authorities were forced to free a Manchester terrorist in 2009 due to lack of evidence, when US prosecutors managed to convict the same man on Wednesday.
Greater Manchester’s chief constable, Sir Peter Fahy, has said Abid Naseer, who was arrested six years ago amid fears that he was planning to bomb the city’s Arndale shopping centre, should have been put on trial in the UK.
However, Fahy explained his force’s inability to collect sufficient evidence against Naseer by saying the need to protect the public had taken priority.
Pakistani-born Abid Naseer, 28, was the head of a UK-based cell of young al-Qaida recruits under orders to infiltrate and attack western society.
Before his arrest he was believed to have been planning operations on multiple transatlantic targets including the New York subway, in an event that would rival 9/11.
However, after UK police found no explosives, the men were released without charge. Naseer was only rearrested in July 2010 at the request of US prosecutors. After a series of court challenges he was extradited to New York in 2013.
During his trial, in which Naseer acted as his own lawyer, prosecutors presented evidence linking him with declassified documents seized in Osama bin Laden’s compound in during the US Navy Seal raid in 2011 in which the al-Qaida leader died. On Wednesday he was convicted by a jury.
Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Fahy agreed that Naseer should have been brought to trial in the UK. “We did absolutely think he should have been prosecuted here and called for a review into the circumstances. We put evidence in front of the Crown Prosecution Service, but at the end of the day we have an independent [charging] system in this country and that is their decision.
“I had to be driven at the time by the need to protect the people of Greater Manchester. The difficulty we had was because we were very concerned about the nature of the threat that was being run and governed by a foreign terrorist organisation, and because we were unsure at the time about exactly what was going to happen, we had to intervene early to disrupt the plot.
“That obviously meant we didn’t have all the evidence we might have had later in the investigation.”
Fahy said: “We are obviously pleased now that a conviction has arisen, but the case does need to be reviewed.
“There was a robust debate at the time [with the CPS] and we put in a lot of challenges. But you have also got to take into account that the Americans have been able to draw together further evidence since our investigation, including the evidence from Bin Laden’s house.
Tony Lloyd, the elected police and crime commissioner for Greater Manchester, said he would be raising the issue with the home secretary.
“The reality is that, had the Americans not acted, a dangerous man who was intent on causing death and destruction here in Greater Manchester could potentially still be walking our streets,” Lloyd said. “This is deeply worrying and I will be raising this issue with the home secretary because we need real assurances that whatever went wrong here is never repeated.
“The work by police and security services in this case has been tremendous. This investigation ensured that potentially hundreds of people were not killed on the streets of Greater Manchester. I have no doubt that lives were saved.
“But we should not have had to wait for the Americans to step in to extradite Abid Naseer. The public will want to know why he wasn’t brought to trial here.”
Fahy denied that police were forced to arrest Naseer and his alleged accomplices earlier than intended, after former Metropolitan police assistant commissioner Bob Quick inadvertently exposed documents on the case outside 10 Downing Street. The sensitive operational documents were captured by press photographers and the mistake cost Quick his job.
At the time, it was believed that the raids on Naseer and other alleged conspirators, which were carried out in broad daylight, were conducted far ahead of schedule after Quick’s blunder.
“That obviously did happen, but that [document] actually said that we were planning to make those arrests because of the fact that we had to protect the people of Greater Manchester,” Fahy added.
Naseer grew up in Peshawar, Pakistan, in a wealthy, middle-class family, his father working as a government contractor and property developer. He came to the UK in 2006 aged 19 on a student visa, he said to improve his English language and study computer science at a college in Manchester. He lived in the Cheetham Hill area of the city, which has a large Pakistani population.
The CPS defended its decision in 2009 not to charge him. “The evidence in our possession in relation to Abid Naseer which would have been admissible in a criminal court was very limited,” said a spokeswoman. “Crucially, there was no evidence of training, research or the purchasing of explosives.
“We had no evidence of an agreement between Abid Naseer and others which would have supported a charge of conspiracy in this country. The evidence used by the US authorities to extradite a suspect does not need to meet the same tests as set out in the code for crown prosecutors.”
During the trial at Brooklyn federal court, MI5 agents testified wearing disguises. Most of the case hinged on email exchanges in 2009 between Naseer and a person described by prosecutors as an al-Qaida handler who was directing plots to attack civilians in Manchester, New York City and Copenhagen.
Naseer faces a lifetime in prison.
