Khalife pulled off his bike on canal towpath
Police have issued a new statement on Daniel Khalife’s capture:
Commander Dominic Murphy, the Metropolitan Police’s counter-terrorism chief, said Daniel Khalife was pulled off a bike by the officer that arrested him.
At 10.41am he was arrested in Rowdell Road in UB5 in London on the canal towpath.
He was actually arrested by a plain clothes officer… and he was riding a pedal cycle so a pushbike at the time, was pulled off that pushbike by that officer and arrested at that location.
Upon being detained by the officer he was fully co-operative and handcuffed and arrested.
Key events
Here’s a map showing the route of Daniel Khalife’s escape and where he was arrested.
Labour is demanding answers from the government now that Khalife has been arrested.
Shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper said: “We need answers about how on earth a prisoner charged with terror and national security offences could have escaped in this way.”
Commander Murphy said he recognises the impact the search for Daniel Khalife had on people who have been “inconvenienced” at the borders of the UK.
He told reporters:
Loads of people have contacted us from the public, we’ve had tremendous support from around the country in borders.
I fully recognise the impact this has had both on those people in London where we have been focusing a lot of our effort, but also at the borders where the public have been inconvenienced and our borders colleagues and police officers who have had to work very, very hard at the borders to manage that demand.
These are not decisions we take really lightly and it was really important to us, and for the investigations, and clearly for the country – this man was charged with breaches of the Official Secrets Act – a very significant case and as a result that was a necessary part of our strategy to find him.
Commander Murphy told reporters the Met received “well over 100 calls” from members of the public, with the number increasing “substantially” on Friday evening and in the early hours of Saturday.
He described the investigation as “extremely complicated”, with a lot of police activity being led by intelligence.
Detailing where Khalife had been spotted, Murphy said the force was informed of two sightings in the Chiswick area, causing them to redeploy resources into the area.
The last confirmed sighting of the suspect was in the Church Street and Chiswick Mall area, he added.
Commander Dominic Murphy told reporters the 21-year-old former soldier, who escaped HMP Wandsworth four days ago, was arrested on suspicion of being unlawfully at large and being an escaped prisoner.
Speaking about the investigation, Mr Murphy told reporters:
It’s been about 75 hours since he went missing from the prison to the point of his arrest. That’s pretty quick given the challenge of trying to find this individual.
He was arrested yesterday for being unlawfully at large and for being an escaped prisoner.
In terms of the investigation, it really gathered momentum yesterday afternoon, with a number of calls from the public, but really took a different course last night, when we did an intelligence-led search in the Richmond area in the early hours of this morning.
Whilst we didn’t find him at that search, while we were at that search, we had a number of calls from the public over the next hour or two, giving us various sightings of him.”
Addressing the arrest, Mr Murphy said after he was pulled off the push bike, Khalife was “fully cooperative and handcuffed and arrested”.
He said:
At 10.41am he was arrested in Rowdell Road in UB5 in London on the canal towpath.
He was actually arrested by a plain clothes officer… and he was riding a pedal cycle, so a pushbike, at the time, was pulled off that pushbike by that officer and arrested at that location.
Upon being detained by the officer he was fully co-operative and handcuffed and arrested.”
Anyone who helped Khalife will face justice – police
Commander Dominic Murphy said police will ensure that anyone who helped or supported Daniel Khalife in his escape faces justice.
He told reporters:
It is important to say now though, now he is in custody, and he is in custody in a west London police station, this is still an ongoing investigation so he still has to stand trial for the original offences for which he was on remand and clearly we now need to go and complete the rest of our investigation into his escape.
If we identify anybody who helped and supported him we will be looking for them and ensuring that they also face justice.
Khalife pulled off his bike on canal towpath
Police have issued a new statement on Daniel Khalife’s capture:
Commander Dominic Murphy, the Metropolitan Police’s counter-terrorism chief, said Daniel Khalife was pulled off a bike by the officer that arrested him.
At 10.41am he was arrested in Rowdell Road in UB5 in London on the canal towpath.
He was actually arrested by a plain clothes officer… and he was riding a pedal cycle so a pushbike at the time, was pulled off that pushbike by that officer and arrested at that location.
Upon being detained by the officer he was fully co-operative and handcuffed and arrested.
You can read our full report on Daniel Khalife’s capture here:
A brief history of Britain’s most daring prison breaks
Duncan Campbell
It is nearly 60 years since, as the Guardian reported at the time: “The 30-year prison sentence which Ronald Arthur Biggs, one of the Great Train Robbers, began 15 months ago was abruptly placed in suspense yesterday afternoon when he was allowed out to exercise in the yard of Wandsworth prison, London. With three other prisoners he disappeared over the 20ft-high wall while his guards, obstructed by men still on exercise, watched helplessly.”
The reporter Tony Geraghty added that, like the train robbery itself, “this operation was characterised by panache and flamboyance”.
While reports this week are less likely to suggest that “panache and flamboyance” were involved in the flight of Daniel Khalife from the same institution, it will certainly go down as a remarkable prison escape.
Continue reading here:
Timeline: how Daniel Khalife became Britain’s most wanted man
Harry Taylor
6 September 2023
7.32am
Khalife goes missing from HMP Wandsworth and is thought to have strapped himself to the underside of a Bidfood delivery vehicle. He was working in the kitchens at the prison in south-west London, and is believed to have escaped still wearing the uniform of white T-shirt and red and white gingham trousers.
7.50am
Prison staff declare Khalife missing.
8.15am
The Metropolitan police are called by prison staff at HMP Wandsworth and told that Khalife has gone missing.
8.37am
The Bidfood lorry that Khalife escaped in is stopped in upper Richmond Road near the junction with Carlton Drive in Putney. Footage later showed that Khalife had walked away from the lorry at the junction with Wandsworth roundabout, a mile from the prison.
3.30pm
Scotland Yard announces to the public that it is urgently looking for Khalife and that he had escaped from prison that morning.
7 September
The search for Khalife enters its second day. The justice secretary, Alex Chalk, confirms that there will be an independent investigation. He also says urgent reviews will be launched into the categorisation and placement of all HMP Wandsworth prisons. A man is stopped by police at Banbury train station in Oxfordshire, believed to be Khalife, but it is not him. Junctions of the M20 are shut down as part of the search. The number of port staff at Dover searching and checking vehicles is doubled.
8 September
Detectives close off access to the 2,500-acre Richmond Park to search for Khalife. The park is just over four miles from HMP Wandsworth. Specialist teams use thermal scanners as part of the hunt. He is thought to know the area after growing up in Kingston, south-west London. The Metropolitan police commissioner, Sir Mark Rowley, says the force is looking into whether the escape was an inside job. There is a sighting of Khalife in Wandsworth town centre, and the force offers a £20,000 reward for information. Meanwhile a close family member tells the Times that Khalife should give himself up.
9 September
8.50am
Police begin focusing their search around the Chiswick area, less than five miles from HMP Wandsworth, in west London across the River Thames. A spokesperson says detectives believe that Khalife has changed out of his uniform and is now wearing dark clothes. They say members of the public have reported sightings of him.
11am
The Metropolitan police catch Khalife in Chiswick and take him in to police custody.
What we know so far
If you’re just joining us, here are the main developments:
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Daniel Khalife, the former soldier who escaped Wandsworth prison on Wednesday, has been caught.
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Khalife was apprehended just before 11am in Chiswick, west London.
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The justice secretary, Alex Chalk, said the investigation into Khalife’s absconsion would leave “no stone unturned”
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Labour’s Yvette Cooper said the public “need answers about how on earth a prisoner charged with terror & national security offences could have escaped”.