Ex-Soldier Daniel Khalife Guilty Of Spying For Iran After Admitting Prison Escape

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Former soldier Daniel Khalife has been found guilty of spying for Iran, but cleared of carrying out a bomb hoax.

The 23-year-old, who previously admitted to escaping from prison, was accused of collecting secret information and passing it to agents of the Middle Eastern country while serving in the Royal Corps of Signals.

Prosecutors told the ex-soldier’s trial he played “a cynical game”, claiming he wanted a career as a double agent to help the British Intelligence Services, when in fact he gathered “a very large body of restricted and classified material” – while police described him as the “ultimate Walter Mitty character that was having a significant impact on the real world”.

On Thursday, after 23 hours of deliberation, a jury at Woolwich Crown Court convicted Khalife of breaching the Official Secrets Act and Terrorism Act, but acquitted him of perpetrating a bomb hoax.

The defendant, wearing a blue shirt and pale trousers, calmly replaced his glasses as the verdicts were read out, and did not show any emotion.

The 23-year-old was accused of collecting secret information and passing it to agents of the Middle Eastern country while serving in the Royal Corps of Signals (PA Media)He had pleaded guilty partway through his trial to escaping from HMP Wandsworth in south-west London in September 2023 by clinging to the underside of a food delivery truck using a sling made from kitchen trousers.

Khalife’s trial heard he created and passed on fake documents supposedly from MPs, senior military officials and the security services – but also sent genuine army documents.

Having reached out to a “middle-man” by sending him a Facebook message, Khalife told the Iranians he would stay undercover in the British Army for “25-plus years” for them, having joined in 2018 two weeks before his 17th birthday.

In 2021, Khalife secretly gathered the names of serving soldiers, including those in the special forces. He took a photo of a handwritten list of 15 of them, having been sent an internal spreadsheet of promotions in June 2021. Prosecutors believe he sent the list to Iran before deleting any evidence.

A police officer captured Daniel Khalife on a canal towpath in west London on 9 September 2023 (PA Media)After his arrest, he told police he had wanted to offer himself to UK security agencies all along, having emailed MI6 as early as 2019.

Khalife told jurors he wanted to prove bosses wrong after being told his Iranian heritage could stop him working in military intelligence, and came up with his elaborate double agent plot after watching the TV spy thriller Homeland.

Khalife’s barrister, Gul Nawaz Hussain KC, said his double agent plot was “hapless” and “sometimes bordering on the slapstick”, more “Scooby-Doo” than James Bond or Homeland.

Prosecutors also alleged Khalife prepared a bomb hoax at his Staffordshire barracks in January 2023. But the trial heard how a soldier who arrived in the room pulled wires out of the device to prove it was not real. A bomb disposal unit was only called after police attended and looked at the device several days later, the court was told.

The defendant had pleaded guilty partway through his trial to escaping from HMP Wandsworth in south-west London in September 2023 (PA Wire)The former soldier had pleaded guilty to escaping HMP Wandsworth earlier this month.

While on the run, he bought clothes from Marks & Spencer and a coffee from McDonald’s, while he stole a hat from a Mountain Warehouse store. He walked along the River Thames and started using a bicycle he found before being caught by police three days later.

The officer who captured Khalife on a canal towpath in west London on 9 September 2023, described the prisoner as “jovial” and told jurors he “congratulated me on catching him”.

Khalife made one last attempt to contact the Iranians before he was found, sending a Telegram message which said simply: “I wait.”

A Mausoleum in Kensall Green where Daniel Khalife is alleged to have collected a drop (Metropolitan Police/PA Wire)Concern he would try a similar stunt during his trial was so high that during his evidence, he was brought to and from the witness box in handcuffs.

Khalife told his trial that the reason he escaped was in the hope he would be kept in a high-security unit (HSU) at a different prison, HMP Belmarsh, away from “sex offenders” and “terrorists” after his recapture.

Dominic Murphy, head of the Metropolitan Police’s Counter Terrorism Command, said of Khalife’s crimes: “Ego is a factor, I’ve got no doubt he’s got an uncanny ability to manipulate others. I think he probably enjoyed the thrill of deception throughout.”

The former soldier will be sentenced early next year.

While on the run, Khalife bought clothes from Marks & Spencer and a coffee from McDonald’s, while he stole a hat from a Mountain Warehouse store (PA Wire)Khalife’s actions could have put military personnel’s lives at risk and “prejudiced” the UK’s national security, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said.

Bethan David, from the CPS, said: “As a serving soldier of the British Army Daniel Khalife was employed and entrusted to uphold and protect the national security of this country. But, for purposes of his own, Daniel Khalife used his employment to undermine national security.

“It is against the law to collate and share secret and sensitive information for a purpose against the interests of the United Kingdom. Such hostile and illegal activities jeopardise the national security of the United Kingdom, and the CPS will always seek to prosecute anyone that carries out counter state threats.”

A Government spokeswoman said: “We welcome today’s verdict. This was an incredibly complex case. We thank our security partners, the police and the Crown Prosecution Service for their work to uncover this individual’s crimes and bring them to justice.”

Khalife’s jailbreak shone a light on the “shocking” level of chaos at HMP Wandsworth, with the prisons watchdog describing it as “symbolic of the problems that characterise what is worst about the English prison system”.

In a report published earlier this year, HMP Wandsworth’s Independent Monitoring Board (IMB) said an audit found 81 security failings at the scandal-hit Victorian jail in the wake of the escape, while an internal review made 39 recommendations.

The IMB said the incident led to multiple reviews and action, including “previously unavailable funding” being found for security improvements and “significant investment” in a bid to stop illicit items being taken into the prison.

The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) is yet to outline their findings or confirm whether any disciplinary action against staff at the prison has been taken.

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