A 16-year-old boy has been convicted in Germany for supporting a foiled terror attack on Taylor Swift‘s shows in Austria last year.
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The teenager, referred to only as Mohammed A under Germany’s privacy laws, was convicted of preparing a serious act of violence and supporting a terrorist act of violence abroad.
After being charged in June, on Tuesday (August 26), he was given a suspended 18-month sentence. The trial took place behind closed doors because of his age, during which he is said to have given a “comprehensive confession”.
The defendant, who was aged 14 at the time, was a Syrian national who had supported the ideology of the Islamic State group.
The court heard that between mid July and August 2024, he was in contact with the man in Austria via social media who had planned to attack one of Taylor Swift’s ‘Eras’ shows in Vienna last summer. Mohammed A had sent the man a video containing instructions for building a bomb and also organised contact with an IS member.
The terror plot was uncovered by authorities and all three Vienna shows were cancelled. Swift later commented on the cancellations, calling them “devastating”, while saying she was “grateful to the authorities because thanks to them, we were grieving concerts and not lives”.
The main suspect was arrested in Ternitz, south of Vienna, before the concerts following a tip-off by the CIA. A second person was also arrested in the Austrian capital around the same time, followed by a third suspect days later.
The 19-year-old man reportedly fully confessed to planning the terror attack in the days following his arrest, saying he planned to use knives and self-made explosives to kill as many people as possible. A police search of his house reportedly led to found chemicals, explosives, knives and machete knives being found. Authorities also identified Islamic State and al-Qaida material at the residence.
