Muslim convert is jailed for 18 years over nail bombing

A Muslim convert who tried to blow up a packed restaurant in Exeter in a suicide attack was jailed for a minimum of 18 years at the Old Bailey today.

Nicky Reilly, 22, accidentally set off a home-made nail bomb in a lavatory as he prepared to target dozens of customers. Sentencing him to life imprisonment, Mr Justice Calvert-Smith said it was only "sheer luck or chance that he did not succeed in his objective."

The judge dismissed an application to have Reilly sent to Broadmoor maximum security hospital for assessment. He ruled that although the attempted bomber had had psychiatric problems in the past and suffered from a mild form of Asperger's Syndrome that did not affect his terrorist intentions.

"He has been described by family and acquaintances as quiet, likeable, law abiding and a naive person normally," the judge said. "But the sad fact is that this sort of crime has been committed in the main by people who in other respects were not apparently criminally minded because they were pursuing what they believed to be a religious agenda."

Reilly, of Plymouth, who injured only himself in the blast in May last year, admitted attempted murder and preparing an act of terrorism.

The court heard he carried out his attack on the Giraffe restaurant in Exeter after being egged on by people from Pakistan he met on the internet. He carried his homemade bombs on the bus and intended to run out into the packed dining area holding three bottles, filled with caustic soda, kerosene, and nails, to his stomach.

But he got stuck in the lavatory as he prepared the blast - one of the bottles exploded before he could leave the cubicle. Dozens of customers fled in panic and the bomber staggered out with serious facial injuries.

Reilly converted to Islam between 2002 and 2003. He was intent on becoming a martyr by killing himself and others and wrote: "That is my dream."