Aaron Driver died after detonating an explosive device in the backseat of a taxi as police closed in on him outside his property Police descended on Driver’s home after United States authorities alerted them that he planned to launch what could have been a “dreadful” attack, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) said during a press conference.
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Police say they had previously arrested him past year over pro-ISIS posts on social media, and he was since under a strict ban on using all social media.
Aaron Driver, 24, was killed Wednesday during a police raid outside the home where he was staying with his sister in the town of Strathroy, Ontario, after he detonated a small explosive in the back seat of a cab.
A Canadian man who had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group in a video was shot dead in a taxi after setting off an explosive device, police acting to thwart an imminent attack said Thursday.
After being tipped-off by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, in Washington, that an attack in Canada was imminent the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) subsequently traced the threat back to a man who was already on their watch list.
The full video, which police showed to journalists Thursday, shows a man wearing a black balaclava saying Canada had ” received many warnings” against fighting against Islamic State.
He had been under the spotlight for at least a year, as authorities believed he was a threat because he could help terror groups. Police keep watch around a house in Strathroy, Ontario, Wednesday, Aug. 10, 2016.
Authorities believed the plan was in the final stages and would occur within 72 hours.
Police arrested him at that home on terror charges last June.
Driver had also expressed support for the terrorists who attacked the Canadian parliament building in 2014. But he said Wednesday’s incident – and the discovery that a terror suspect lived only a stone’s throw away – hit “a little too close to home”.
Later that morning, around 11 a.m., RCMP say they confirmed that the person in the video was Aaron Driver through video snapshots.
Driver died after detonating an explosive device in the backseat of a taxi as police closed in on him.
It’s not clear yet how Driver died.
The inside of the cab where Aaron Driver detonated an explosive device on August 10, 2016.
US and Canadian authorities do not immediately know who is shown in the video or where he lives.
“Canadian Muslim communities are relieved that this alleged terrorist plot has been thwarted by swift action by the RCMP and our security agencies”.
“There’s been a number of incidents where law enforcement in Canada has been able to intervene to prevent attacks in the last several years, and I think that’s a reflection of the level of collaboration we have here”, he said.
The Ottawa attack came two days after a man, described by authorities as an Islamic State group-inspired terrorist, ran over two soldiers in a parking lot in Quebec, killing one and injuring the other before being shot to death by police. He was being electronically monitored since then.
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Speaking after the shooting, his father Wayne Driver said that his son converted to Islam as a teenager and became radicalized as the two split apart following his mother’s death.
