Terrorism charges dropped against UNSW student; Police refuse to apologise

NSW Police have dropped all charges filed against University of New South Wales student Mohamed Nizamdeen, who had been accused of terrorism plot targeting the Opera House and former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull.

The 25-year-old PhD student was said to be plotting a series of lone-wolf attacks targeting notable landmarks and Turnbull, who was still the prime minister a few days before Nizamdeen was arrested on Aug. 30. He was arrested following an NSW Joint Counter Terrorism Team (JCTT) investigation, with detectives accusing him of writing his plans to kill Turnbull and then-Foreign Affairs minister Julie Bishop in his notebook. The notebook was found on campus at UNSW.

On Friday, police dropped the charge of collecting or making documents likely to facilitate terrorist act. The prosecution relied heavily and almost exclusively on the notebook, hence they knew the case would not be able to proceed.

Last month, Nizamdeen was released on bail after prosecutors were forced to concede that a handwriting expert could not link the writings in the notebook to Nizamdeen. They had to drop the charge after receiving “definite advice” on the handwriting in the notebook.

“What authorities have done to this young man is absolutely unforgivable,” His lawyer Moustafa Kheir said outside the court on Friday. His client spent a month in maximum security prison after being charged.

Kheir said Nizamdeen would be suing the police for compensation for the “unforgivable circumstances” that he had gone through. But NSW police have refused to apologise, with assistant commissioner Mick Willing denying that they had ruined Nizamdeen’s life. He instead blamed “those who were involved in the production and manufacture” of the notebook for the “impact” they had on Nizamdeen.

Although the charges have been dropped and withdrawn, investigations were still ongoing because “there were very serious threats against individuals contained within that document.” Investigators, he said, had aced in good faith and notified prosecutors as soon as they realised their evidence was flimsy.

Nizamdeen’s cost application was scheduled for hearing on Nov. 23. He is in Australia on a student visa. The Sri Lankan native had no criminal record and had even worked with NSW Police in 2016 to develop an app to help adapt to life in Australia.