‘Lone wolf terrorist’ stopped from detonating bomb outside hospital by patient who talked him down, trial hears

An alleged “self-radicalised, lone wolf terrorist” was planning to “kill as many nurses as possible” at a hospital in Leeds but a patient managed to “talk him down”, a court heard.

Mohammad Farooq, 28, was arrested with a pressure cooker bomb outside the Gledhow Wing of St James’s Hospital in Leeds, in the early hours of 20 January last year.

Prosecutors said Farooq planned to “seek his own martyrdom” in a “murderous terrorist attack” by detonating the bomb, then killing as many people as possible with knives before using an imitation firearm to incite police to shoot him dead.

Opening the trial, the prosecution said Farooq had immersed himself in an “extremist Islamic ideology” and his “plan A” had been to attack RAF Menwith Hill, which is a base in North Yorkshire used by the US.

Read more: Sky News