By Murder of MP Sir David Amess carried out by ‘Radicalised Islamist terrorist’ a court heard
Sir David, MP for Southend West, was stabbed during a constituency surgery.
The attack happened in Leigh-on-Sea, Essex, on 15 October.
According to reports, Ali Harbi Ali had carried out reconnaissance of potential targets over several years.
The 26-year-old denies murder and preparing acts of terrorism.
Prosecutor Tom Little QC described the defendant as a “radicalized Islamist terrorist”.
He cited a “murder carried out because of a warped and twisted and violent ideology”.
“This was nothing less than an assassination for terrorist purposes,” he said.
“It is a crime to which, we say, he has no defense.”
The court heard Mr. Ali had requested an appointment with Sir David under the pretense he was moving to the area.
Mr. Little told jurors that Mr. Ali appeared “relaxed and chatty” before he walked over to Sir David and carried out the ‘vicious’ attack.
Mr. Ali continued to wave a bloody knife shouting “I killed him, I killed him”, the court was told.
Mr. Little said the defendant then shouted to those in the church: “I want him dead. I want every Parliament Minister [sic] who signed up for the bombing of Syria who agreed to the Iraqi war to die.”
According to reports, he refused to drop his knife and said he wanted to be shot and “I want to die; I want to be a hero”.
“The defendant hoped that he would be shot, killed, a martyr for the terrorist cause.
“However, this was not outside the Houses of Parliament, central London, but Leigh-on-Sea and the first police attendees were not firearms officers but PC Scott James and PC Ryan Curtis.”
Sir David, first elected as a Conservative MP in Basildon in Essex in 1983, was pronounced dead at the scene, where Mr. Ali was arrested by police.
Mr. Little said: “It was a murder carried out by that young man [Mr. Ali] who for many years had been planning just such an attack and who was, and is, a committed, fanatical, radicalized Islamist terrorist.”
He said: “He had for the number of years been determined to carry out an act of domestic terrorism.”
The preparing acts of terrorism charge relates to acts alleged to have been carried out between 1 May 2019 and 28 September 2021.
The trial continues.
