'Internet taught my son how to make a bomb', says mother of student

The mother of a 20-year-old student who planted a home-made bomb on a busy Tube train said: “The internet taught my son how to make a bomb.”

He was convicted of planting the device – made using a £2 Tesco clock – on the Jubilee line train on Wednesday.

His rucksack was discovered packed with explosives and ball bearing shrapnel, on a train at north Greenwich, on October 20 last year.
His mother, Antonitza Smith, 48, said in an interview with the Times: “If it wasn’t for Google and YouTube he wouldn’t know how to make a bomb.”

Her son told detectives that he had left the device “as a prank” when he had time to kill between maths lessons but a jury at the Old Bailey found him guilty of possession of an explosive substance with intent.

   Mrs Smith, from Rotherhithe, south London, told the newspaper: “When he was at his computer I thought he was safe. In the end his computer was the enemy.

"He had an interest in how things work. He said to me 'I know how they did that' about the Boston bombers (following an attack on the city’s marathon in April 2013).”

She added that her son, who studied computer forensics at London Metropolitan University, could “hack things” and said he had hacked Devonshire Council’s system to change the exam marks of a boy who had been bullying him when he was 12 years old.

The single mum, whose son has Asperger’s syndrome, said he had been “bullied all his life” .

She told the Times: “They should make it harder (to access dangerous material online). They should toughen up their software.”

He developed an interest in Islam while studying for a GCSE in Religious Studies and told police he believed the faith was “more true”.

On a list of ingredients for his bomb he wrote: “And keep this a secret between me and Allah.”
His mother said: “I believe it was a prank.
"He told me, he said 'Mum, if I wanted to make a proper bomb I could have'.”