An Austrian court on May 28 sentenced a 21-year-old man who admitted planning a foiled Islamist attack on a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna in 2024 to 15 years in prison.
Austrian national Beran A, whose last name has been withheld in accordance with Austrian privacy rules, was arrested on Aug. 7, 2024, the day before the first of three planned concerts by the American superstar in the Austrian capital.
All three performances were canceled, to the dismay of fans, known as “Swifties,” with the singer later saying on social media that it was “devastating.”
Authorities said in 2024 that he took an oath of allegiance to the leader of the ISIS terrorist group before plotting the attacks, which they said were intended to kill “as many people as possible.”
Last month, he pleaded guilty to a number of charges related to the planned attack.
Identity, Face Hidden
Beran A hid his face with a ring binder as he entered the courtroom in Wiener Neustadt, a town south of the capital, on May 28.
“I would just like to say that I am sorry,” he said in a final statement before the jury retired to consider its verdict.
It later found him guilty on almost all of the charges.
The court found he had tried unsuccessfully to illegally purchase weapons, including a machine gun and a hand grenade, after following instructions in an ISIS video entitled “Make a bomb in the kitchen of your mom.”
His aim was to produce a small amount of the explosive triacetone triperoxide (TATP).
He was further accused of plotting with two school friends to carry out solo attacks earlier in 2024 in separate Middle Eastern cities, when all three were teenagers.
He and co-defendant Arda K admitted they traveled to Dubai and Istanbul, respectively, to carry out attacks, but they did not follow through with the plans.
Dubai ‘Panic Attack’
Beran A told the court last month that he roamed the streets of Dubai in March 2024 in search of victims to stab, but stalled when he had a panic attack.
He and Arda K denied providing moral support to a third man, an Iraqi national identified as Hasan E, who was arrested in Mecca, accused of stabbing a security official at the Grand Mosque. He remains in pretrial detention in Saudi Arabia.
Baran A. and Arda K. were both found guilty of charges including traveling and training for terrorist purposes, and being part of a terrorist organization, the Austria Press Agency reported.
The jury found Beran A guilty by unanimous decision on all but two of 15 points put to it, including providing moral support to the third man.
He was found not guilty on two lesser charges related to issues such as spreading ISIS propaganda.
Plotter ‘Burst Into Tears’
Beran A’s lawyer, Anna Mair, said her client had shown more emotion in private than in the courtroom.
“When he understood he had been found guilty in relation to Mecca, he burst into tears,” she told reporters. “I think that was simply because this big weight that these two years of being under investigation brought with them fell from his shoulders.”
Arda K, described as a Slovak national, was found guilty unanimously on all charges and sentenced to 12 years in prison. Both men’s lawyers said they had not yet decided whether to appeal.
“Having our Vienna shows canceled was devastating,” Swift wrote in a statement posted to Instagram two weeks after the plot was foiled. “The reason for the cancellations filled me with a new sense of fear, and a tremendous amount of guilt because so many people had planned on coming to those shows.”
Swift resumed her global Eras Tour the week after the Vienna shows were halted.
CIA Alerted Austrian Authorities
The United States provided intelligence that fed into the decision to cancel the concerts.
Then-CIA Deputy Director David Cohen told the annual intelligence and national security summit in Maryland on Aug. 28, 2024, that the agency alerted the Austrian authorities, who were not permitted to monitor smartphone messages.
The previous Austrian government announced plans in 2024 to bolster the country’s capacity to combat terrorism in the wake of the Vienna concert plot.
Herbert Kickl, who leads the Freedom Party of Austria, said in August 2024 that the case shows the consequences of failed migration and integration policies.
Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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