Convicted terrorist Usman Khan was attending a prisoner rehabilitation workshop near London Bridge on 29 November 2019 before fatally stabbing two people and injuring three others. Khan, who was wearing a fake suicide vest, was then gunned down by police.
A senior MI5 officer has told the inquest into the 2019 Fishmongers' Hall attack they knew Usman Khan was going to be attending an event in London but did not see it as a “potential source of risk.”
Witness A, a deputy director of MI5, had earlier told the inquest at the Guildhall in London on Thursday, 13 May, that the agency had advised against Khan being allowed on a dumptruck driving course a few months earlier because they feared the “reputational damage” if he later committed an attack using such a vehicle.
Khan stabbed to death Jack Merritt and Saskia Jones during a Learning Together prisoner rehabilitation workshop at the Fishmongers' Hall, close to London Bridge, in November 2019.
Witness A replied: “I think at that time there was no intelligence to suggest that he should not be allowed to attend. The flip side occasionally that you also need to bear in mind is that preventing somebody from doing something can also have ramifications, and that would have been in mind, I'm absolutely sure, of those who were managing him in the community.”
Mr Hough persisted: “From the perspective of a senior intelligence officer, though, would you not…
