Streatham attack: Sudesh Amman freed after serving half his sentence – live news | UK news

Nazir Afzal, former chief crown prosecutor for north-west England, has said, as he did after November’s London Bridge attack, which was – like the Streatham attack – carried out by a convicted terrorist, that he warned Boris Johnson four years ago about the threat posed by such individuals on release. He said he told Johnson that proper de-radicalisation programmes were needed with mentoring to which the response was that “that costs money”.

He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme this morning that longer sentences were not the answer.

We could have delayed this inevitable crime by a few months if we’d given him that [a longer sentence] but there is a real problem with de-radicalisation and disengagement programmes. They have been largely underfunded, they are poorly executed.

He said that other countries have achieved success with such programmes.

Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Sir Lanka and Denmark have world renowned evaluated de-radicalisation programmes, properly resourced, which are making a significant difference.

He said Denmark’s programme has a success rate of something like 98%. Afzal also said that some “excellent” de-radicalisation programmes in the UK are run by former extremists “but I’ve heard myself the government doesn’t want to work with former extremists”.

Hello, this is Haroon Siddique taking over the liveblog from Jessica.

A witness told Sky News he thought at the time that it was probably gang-related.

London Ambulance Service has denied reports it took them 30 minutes to arrive on the scene of the terror attack in Streatham yesterday.

They said they arrived in four minutes, but had to wait until police said it was safe to approach the victims.

Police confirmed attacker Sudesh Amman was wearing a fake bomb vest.

Dave Chawner said he waited with one of the victims for 30 minutes.

One man in his 40s who was stabbed is no longer in a life-threatening condition, while another victim in her 50s has been discharged from hospital.

Another woman in her 20s is being treated in hospital for minor injuries, believed to have been caused by glass breaking after the gunshots being fired.

Ian Acheson, who led an independent review in 2016 of Islamist extremism in prisons, probation and youth justice, said some people are so dangerous they might need to be kept in prison “indefinitely”.

He told the BBC’s Today programme: “We are going to have to accept that we have to be much more sceptical and robust about dealing with the risk of harm.

“We may need to accept that there are certain people who are so dangerous they must be kept in prison indefinitely.”

He also said he was “concerned” about the prison service’s ability to manage terrorist offenders.

He added: “Blame is a strong word – the prison service obviously cannot be blamed for lawfully releasing this man when they had to.

“I am more concerned about what happened when he was in custody. I am still unconvinced that the prison service itself has the aptitude or the attitude to assertively manage terrorist offenders.”

The former head of UK counterterrorism policing, Sir Mark Rowley, said there was a case for giving terrorists indeterminate prison sentences. Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, he said effective rehabilitation and de-radicalisation support was also crucial.

“If someone is clearly driven by an ideology and they believe that slaughtering other people is a sort of God-given purpose, then I can see a case for that,” said Rowley.

“As long as we put alongside it the rehabilitation and de-radicalisation programmes to give someone the opportunity to change their ways and be released.

“I don’t think there should be a lock-up-and-throw-away-the key – we need to be as equally aggressive about trying to help people turn their lives around as we are determined to protect the public.”

The London mayor, Sadiq Khan, said the government needed to provide further reassurances about the roughly 70 people who have been convicted of a terrorist offence and subsequently released from prison.

He added there are also more than 200 people in prison convicted of prison sentences. “So another question I’ve got for the government is what are you doing to make sure those people in prison stay in prison whilst they are a danger to the public?”

The London mayor, Sadiq Khan, has said he is angry about the terror attack in Streatham, which he said, like the London Bridge attack in November, was “preventable and foreseeable”.

“Why was he allowed to be released if the authorities knew he was going to be a danger?”, he told BBC News. “I want to be reassured that the authorities have the resources and support they need to make sure we’re kept safe.”

He criticised changes introduced by the government, which he said have made the public “less safe” by not giving judges the tools they need to keep dangerous offenders in prison.

“This government changed the laws a few years ago to make it more difficult for judges to give the right sentence […] and we have examples of people being radicalised in prison.”

He said he would be lobbying the government to revisit policies such as cuts to prison budgets, privatising the probation service and early release to save money on prison costs.

In the meantime, he said there are still police officers in Streatham where the attack took place and the high street remains closed, while police have confirmed the attack was an isolated incident and they are not looking for anyone else in relation to it.

Boris Johnson has said he will announce “further plans for fundamental changes” to the system for dealing with convicted terrorists today.

Following the London Bridge terror attack in November last year, when former inmate Usman Khan stabbed two people to death at Fishmonger’s Hall, the government said it would move to end automatic early release for serious offenders.

In response to yesterday’s attack in Streatham, the prime minister said: “Following the awful events at Fishmonger’s Hall, we have moved quickly to introduce a package of measures to strengthen every element of our response to terrorism – including longer prison sentences and more money for the police.

“Tomorrow, we will announce further plans for fundamental changes to the system for dealing with those convicted of terrorism offences.”

Welcome to live coverage of the aftermath of yesterday’s terror incident in Streatham, south London, where a man was shot dead by police after he stabbed two people.

The attacker was named as Sudesh Amman, who left prison only days ago and had previously been noted by police as having a “fascination with dying in the name of terrorism”.

He was released after serving half of his sentence of more than three years for the possession and distribution of extremist material, but was under special monitoring by police.

It is expected inquiries will now focus on whether Amman acted alone or with others, and how he was able to launch the attack in broad daylight if he was being monitored.