Thread by @DdesimoneDaniel

Thread on evidence today at the inquests for Jack Merritt and Saskia Jones.

The evidence focused on the killer Usman Khan, a convicted terrorist seen here going to London alone after the trip was approved by police and probation.

His attack happened within hours of this image

Khan, originally from Stoke, spent eight years in prison before his automatic release on licence in December 2018.

A court of appeal judgment on Khan meant the parole board had no say over whether he was released at that stage

He'd been jailed for planning to organise a terrorist training camp in Pakistan.

He remained among the 70 highest risk inmates in the entire country throughout his time in prison.

He was involved in several attacks in jail and associated with notorious terrorists

A 2016 prison intelligence report said he was engaging in a "permissible form of telling lies" to advance the cause of Islam.

A February 2017 prison report said “he has deliberately told lies or ticked boxes to achieve progression"

The inquests have heard that, before his release, Khan engaged with the Learning Together programme that organised the Fishmongers event, telling them he had rejected his past.

The LT organisers have said they were never told about all the prison intelligence on Khan

In October 2018, just prior to his release, an intel report said he was trying to radicalise other inmates and had said he would return to his “old ways” when he left prison.

Jurors were shown a whole series of intelligence entries spanning his eight years inside

In 2011, just after he first arrived in HMP Belmarsh, records said he suggested he had access to a weapon, would “do someone in the eye” and wanted to die and go to paradise.

Shortly afterwards, he was involved in a group attack on a prisoner amid shouts of “Allahu akbar”

The year after, he jumped onto netting between wings and recited a poem that included the phrase “cut off the kufffar's head”.

Also in 2012 he so damaged his cell that he almost broke into a neighbouring one – and he was found with the home address of the prison governor

At later prisons – Long Lartin and Frankland – intelligence said he was “rallying other Muslims” and a “Muslim leader”.

At HMP Woodhill he was deemed to be a “Muslim enforcer in the prison” and that he “headed a bullying gang”

On one occasion he was found to be stockpiling chemicals in his cell, which he'd been given for medical purposes but not taken.

Another time a razor blade was found hidden beneath his cell desk.

Khan was involved in violent attacks himself and incited assaults by others

These incidents included two assaults in HMP Whitemoor in 2017 on a Christian prisoner who had refused to convert to Islam.

On an earlier occasion, a prison chaplain was caught up in an attack by Khan on another prisoner.

An alleged plot to kill a member of staff by a prisoner was thought to have been influenced by Khan.

At Whitemoor he was considered to be one of several leading terrorist prisoners. A later assessment had him as “the senior Muslim figure” on his wing

One intelligence entry from the prison suggested that several prison “emirs” wanted someone killed.

The jury heard Khan was “almost certainly” one of the emirs

An entry from March 2017 recorded that Khan and the killer of Lee Rigby - Michael Adebalajo - were discussing religion “outside their window”.

In 2018 Khan was noted to be huddling with prisoners including Brustom Ziamani, Omar Khyam, and Munir Mohammed and Ummarayiat Mirza

The inquests heard that Ziamani and another prisoner carried out their own attack in Whitemoor weeks after the Fishmmongers attack by Khan

The inquests also heard that a multi-agency panel tasked with managing Khan after his release did not record any discussion about possible risks arising his trip to London to attend the November 2019 Fishmongers' Hall event

Learning Together had first invited Khan to the event in August that year.

Minutes of the multi-agency public protection arrangements (MAPPA) meeting that month noted the invitation, but there is no record of any conversation about potential dangers

Jonathan Hough QC, counsel to the inquests, said in later minutes there is also "no discussion of specific risks related to the London visit or how to mitigate them”

The last MAPPA meeting before the attack happened on 14 November 2019

Mr Hough said the minutes refer to “logistics rather than risks”, meaning how Khan would get to London.

He did so totally alone, carrying three knives he had bought for his attack, a fake suicide belt he made, plus a mask and other relevant items

When he had attended an earlier Learning Together event after his release – which was in HMP Whitemoor itself – he had been accompanied by two police officers there and back