The Sun has a series of stories on the backgrounds of the terrorists arrested yesterday. As I read the accounts, for some reason I kept thinking that Mark Steyn (or someone with his satirical skills) could write a great column on the quotes from family and friends.
Again and again, family or friends expressed surprise that the suspects could be terrorists because they liked football or cricket.
And one of the suspects who had converted from Christianity was described as “always very naughty” (he had been expelled from school):
“His mum is a PE teacher who regularly attends a local Methodist church. She is going to be devastated.
“He married recently but we don’t know much about the wife and hardly ever saw her.
“She would appear in the street from time to time wearing a scarf round her head.” . . .
The owner of a nearby restaurant who has known Stewart-Whyte since he was a boy added: “He went to school with my daughter. He was always very naughty.”
Among the other suspects arrested may have been a mother (along with a young child):
Among those arrested was a woman in her 20s who was taken into custody with her baby, claimed Muslim community leader Imtiaz Qadir last night.
He said: “A young Muslim lady was arrested and they have taken the child too, because it needs to be with its mother.”
He added that he expected “an uproar” among the local community, once news of her arrest became known. . . .