London: A UK court sentenced a man to five and a half years in prison on Thursday after he praised the murderer of French teacher Samuel Paty and posted pictures of the victim's severed head online.
In March, Birmingham Crown Court found 41-year-old Ajmal Shahpal guilty of posting tweets that encouraged others "to commit, prepare for, or incite acts of terrorism."
The murderer of Paty, a French secondary school teacher who was killed by an extremist in October 2020, was referred to on Twitter by Shahpal as "as brave as a lion."
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Additionally, he posted a picture of Paty's severed head lying in the street with the caption, "The insolent had been sent to hell."
At the sentencing, Judge Melbourne Inman stated that you expressed extreme Muslim ideology, which included the beheading of anyone who was thought to have blasphemed your religion.
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Shahpal was detained in March 2021 at his residence in Nottingham, central England, after he tweeted messages supporting a political party with roots in Pakistan that called for the execution of alleged blasphemers.
In September 2020, a day after a second attack on the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, he posted a few tweets to his public account.
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Shahpal argued during the trial that he was sharing other people's opinions on Twitter "just to have some more followers."