VIENNA (Reuters) – A plot to carry out an attack at a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna was foiled on Sunday, with the main suspect’s lawyer trying to downplay the seriousness of the plan, saying her client was just “playing with ideas”.
Three of Swift’s planned concerts this week were canceled as Austrian authorities discovered a plot allegedly masterminded by a 19-year-old to carry out an ISIS-inspired suicide attack at a football stadium where tens of thousands of fans were planning Watch the show there.
Austrian investigators say the young man recently swore to join the Islamic State and made a full confession after police raided his house and seized chemicals, machetes and other devices the plotters planned to use in the bomb attacks. .
Lawyer Ina-Christin Stiglitz told Reuters the young man had only become involved with ISIS in the past month.
“It intrigued him,” she said, suggesting her client didn’t really intend to carry out a serious attack.
“It’s just playing with ideas,” she said. “He said the bomb wasn’t good enough and wouldn’t work.”
She added that he researched how to make bombs online.
Austrian police detained three other teenagers as part of the investigation, including a 17-year-old whom Stiglitz said her client called her “best friend and neighbor.”
Neighbors of the 19-year-old man in the small town of Ternitz expressed shock at his arrest, describing him as reserved but friendly. They said one of the few signs that he might be radicalized was his recent growth of a long beard.
In response to questions about why he changed his appearance, his lawyer said: “He wanted to be cool.”
Chancellor Karl Nehammer said earlier that Austria’s intelligence agencies should have greater powers to monitor communications on messaging apps to stop extremists.
