Somali Gunman Shot Wrong Student on Bus - Gang Hit Missed Its Target

SWEDEN - An 18-year-old high school student was on his way home from school when he was shot in the head on a bus in Tyresö, south of Stockholm. Investigators now believe he was not even the intended target.

Five men are charged over the killing. The 21-year-old Somali citizen who has confessed to the shooting was identified from a handprint and caught after he got stuck in an elevator. Prosecutors want him expelled from Sweden for life once he has served his sentence.

The murder happened on 25 March this year, on a Stockholm public transport bus outside Tyresö upper secondary school, in front of other students and passengers. The 18-year-old had no criminal connections.

The real target took an Uber

According to the investigation, the intended target was another student, the younger brother of a gang criminal. He usually rode the same bus, but that day he had left school early and taken an Uber with some friends.

Investigators say the contract was passed on through the encrypted messaging app Signal. The gunman, Ayman Mohamed Ali, is said to have been in contact with a person linked to the Foxtrot network.

Foxtrot is led by Rawa Majid, known as the "Kurdish Fox", and has been tied to a long string of shootings and bombings in Sweden that have killed several innocent people.

The suspected instigator is believed to be abroad. He has been remanded in his absence but never arrested, so he is not part of this indictment. Prosecutors also link the bus murder to shootings in the Stockholm area and in Malmö.

Police say the person giving orders used the alias "Jihadi John" and told the gunman to shoot the victim in the head. The alias is the nickname of Islamic State executioner Mohammed Emwazi.

The gun clicked first

Witnesses describe a masked man moving through the queue at the bus stop and pointing a pistol at the 18-year-old. Several heard the gun click before he cleared it, stepped onto the bus and fired.

Passengers tried to help, among them a teacher from the student's school. The 18-year-old was taken to hospital and died the following day.

Caught by a handprint and a stuck elevator

As the gunman left the bus he put his hand on the glass of the door. Surveillance footage captured it and police lifted a handprint. By the next morning the National Forensic Centre had matched it to Ayman Mohamed Ali.

He had previous convictions, including aggravated weapons offences, and was out on parole when the student was killed.

After the shooting he left in a taxi, met two men in Huddinge, changed shoes and travelled on to a flat in Eskilstuna to hide. Three days later he got stuck in an elevator and phoned for help, telling the operator where he was. Police were already tapping his phone.

He denied everything at first. After about six weeks in custody he asked for a new interview and confessed, but claimed nobody else knew a murder was planned. He refused to answer questions about the instructions found on his phone.

Lifetime expulsion demanded

Ayman Mohamed Ali is charged with murder and aggravated weapons offences. He is a Somali citizen, and the prosecutor is asking the court to expel him with a lifetime ban on returning to Sweden.

Four other men with immigrant backgrounds, aged 19 to 25, are charged with aiding and abetting murder for allegedly helping with transport and hiding places after the shooting. All four deny wrongdoing. All five are linked to the Årby network in Eskilstuna.

The trial opens on 18 November in a high-security courtroom at Stockholm District Court.