CD: TERROR SUSPECT ‘TRIED’ TO COMPLY WITH CONTROL ORDER

A terror suspect accused of repeatedly breaching a Home Office control order told a court today (Thurs) it was a struggle to keep ‘mentally afloat’.

The 27 year-old Muslim convert, who is identified only as CD, said he was ‘constantly stressed’ by the stringent conditions he is forced to live under.

The dad-of-two was moved from London to Leicester within days of being issued with the control order on February 1 of this year.

Home Secretary Theresa May successfully applied to the High Court that there were ‘reasonable grounds for suspecting the person has been or is involved in terrorist-related activities.’

He told the Old Bailey how he had been surrounded by security officials as he walked along a suburban street in north London to be informed of the decision.

The suspect was given no details as to the reasons for it, only that it was based on intelligence and ‘secret information’.

He was driven to his home address, where the obligations of the order were read to him.

The original set of conditions included a 16-hour curfew between 5pm and 9am and residence at the address in north London.

CD was then moved to an address in Leicester on February. His curfew, monitored by an electronic tag, was relaxed to 12 hours from 8pm to 8am and he was also ordered to sign in at a specified police station between 1pm and 2pm each day.

But between February 11 and July 19 this year he is accused of breaching the order 15 times.

It is alleged CD turned up at the police station between five and 23 minutes later on 10 occasions between March 29 and June 28 this year.

On another five occasions he failed to notify the curfew monitoring company that he was either leaving his address or arriving home, it is said.

Asked if he had deliberately broken the conditions of the control order, CD told the court: ‘No. I tried my best to comply. That’s 100 per cent the case.’

The court heard CD had been forced to move away from his parents and brothers, who still live in north London, and his wife and two children.

Describing his life since moving to Leicester, he went on: ‘There are many obligations. The only two I am here for are in relation to me signing on at the police station on time and me phoning the monitoring company.

‘It is a very stressful situation. Any individual put in a situation has a daily fight just to keep mentally afloat because you are worrying about your thoughts, depression, fear.

‘You are never really given any closure. They come to, say “come with me”, I ask them what is going on and they say it is intelligence, it’s secret information.

‘They put you on it (the control order) they don’t arrest you or interview you, they just say you are on it.’

After the first breach on February 11, in which he was 17 minutes late contacting the monitoring company, he told the operator he had overslept

The following day he is charged with failing to notify the company that he was leaving his home after the curfew ended.

On that occasion he said he was ‘in a rush’ to sign on at the police station and forgot.

On a further occasion he said it ‘slipped his mind’.

He told the jury that on July 19 when he had already been arrested twice and charged for 14 previous breaches, he left the house quickly to make his way to a mosque to pray at 1.30pm before cycling to the police station to sign on.

‘Whilst I was praying something kept nagging me and I realised I didn’t phone the company,’ he said.

‘As soon as I finished my prayer I got on my bike and went back to the house.’

Jurors heard the company had already called the property to find out his whereabouts. The following day he was arrested again and subsequently remanded in custody.

The prosecution accept that on each occasion CD did arrive at the police station and did make contact with the monitoring company.

However it is claimed the order is ‘necessary to restrict their liberty to protect members of the public from the risk of terrorism’ and it is a criminal offence to breach it.

CD, from Leicester, denies 15 counts of contravening control order obligations.

The trial continues.