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15 Years for Vienna Plot
Austrian prosecutors secured a 15-year prison sentence for Beran A., a 21-year-old Austrian man convicted of planning a jihadist attack on a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna during the US singer’s Eras tour in August 2024.
The BBC said Beran A. was arrested after a tip-off from the CIA just before the first of three sold-out Taylor Swift concerts was due to take place in Vienna’s Ernst Happl stadium, and it said all three Austrian shows were immediately cancelled.
CNN reported that Beran A. was arrested on August 7, 2024, the day before the first of three planned concerts, and that he pleaded guilty to charges related to the planned attack that carried a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
CNN also said prosecutors found that Beran A. tried but failed to illegally buy weapons including a machine gun and hand grenade, and that he followed instructions in an Islamic State video entitled “Make a bomb in the kitchen of your mom” to produce a small amount of the explosive triacetone triperoxide (TATP).
Apologies, Lawyers, and Guilty
Before the verdict, Beran A. told the court, “I would just like to say that I am sorry,” and DW reported the same line as the defendant’s words before the court adjourned to consider the verdict on Thursday.
CNN said Beran A.’s lawyer, Anna Mair, argued in her summing up that “Beran is not a leader. He is not an ideological mastermind,” while it said the jury found him guilty on all but two of 15 points put to it.
The Guardian reported that Beran A. was found guilty on charges including those related to the concert, and it said he was arrested on 7 August 2024, the day before the first of three planned concerts by the US pop star in the Austrian capital.
CNN added that Beran A. was tried alongside Arda K, a 21-year-old man from Slovakia, and it said Arda K was sentenced to 12 years in prison after being found guilty, while the third man was arrested in Mecca and remained in custody in Saudi Arabia.
Aftermath and Wider Terror Links
The conviction kept the focus on the cancelled Vienna shows, with AP reporting that the concert plot was thwarted but Austrian authorities still cancelled Swift’s three performances in August 2024.
AP said Beran A. allegedly planned to target people outside the Ernst Happel Stadium with knives or homemade explosives, and it reported that authorities searched his apartment on Aug. 7, 2024, finding bomb-making materials.
AP also described a broader network of alleged terrorism planning, saying Beran A. was tried alongside Arda K and that the two men, along with Hasan E., allegedly planned to carry out simultaneous attacks in Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates during Ramadan 2024 in the name of IS.
In a separate framing of the same case, The New York Times said the authorities acted on a warning from the C.I.A. and raided a house in Ternitz, Austria, in August 2024, uncovering bomb-making components, machetes, knives, counterfeit money and Islamic State propaganda, and it said the suspect had three days to file an appeal after being sentenced to a total of 15 years in prison.
