A terrorist has been found guilty of murdering Sir David Amess at a constituency surgery last year.
Ali Harbi Ali, 26, travelled to Leigh-on-Sea in Essex on October 15 last year and stabbed the veteran Conservative backbencher 21 times with a 12-inch carving knife in front of his aide, before being tackled to the floor by plain-clothes police officers.
Ali, from North London, is said to have chosen Sir David as a target after going through a list of MPs who voted in favour of airstrikes on Syria in the mid-2010s.
Ali had denied murder and preparing acts of terrorism, but a jury at the Old Bailey saw right through it and today found him guilty after deliberating for 18 minutes.
Ali told jurors last week he had no regrets over the killing, saying he did so to prevent Sir David from further "harming Muslims" in Syria.
He said: "If I thought I did anything wrong, I wouldn't have done it."
Ali had sent a manifesto on WhatsApp to family and friends seeking to justify his actions around the time of the attack.
The trial heard how Ali had arranged an appointment to see the Southend West MP under the ruse of being a health worker moving to the area.
He also told Sir David he was "sorry" before plunging the knife into him, causing the politician to scream. The MP died at the scene.
He also threatened to kill the MP's two female aides and a couple who had arrived for their appointment.
Ali was later apprehended by two police officers armed only with batons and spray.
In a police interview, he spoke calmly about his terror plot and admitted allegiance to the so-called Islamic State.
He told police of the moment Sir David was killed: "I felt like one minute I was sat down at the table talking to him and the next he was, sort of, dead.
"But, yeah, it's probably one of the strangest days... of my life now, y'know?"
Sir David's assistant Julie Cushion told jurors he appeared "self-satisfied" in the wake of the brutal killing.
London-born Ali had become self-radicalised in 2014, the court heard.
He had from come an influential Somali family and said he had a childhood "full of love and care".
Ali had previously considered travelling to Syria to fight but by 2019 opted for an attack in Britain.
Ali bought a £20 knife from Argos six years ago and carried it in his bag last summer as he looked at possible targets, jurors heard.
He previously scoped out the Houses of Parliament but found police there "armed to the teeth".
Ali carried out online research on MPs including Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, Deputy Prime Minister Dominic Raab and Defence Secretary Ben Wallace.
He also staked out the London home of Michael Gove six times and wrote scenarios on how he would get to him, which included mingling with media, bumping into him jogging, ringing his doorbell, and causing a scene to "lure" him out.
Today during closing arguments, prosecutor Tom Little QC said the evidence against Ali was "utterly overwhelming and compelling".
He told jurors: "I suggest you will never forget the body-worn footage of the defendant still holding the bloody knife he had had for five years for just such an attack in that church on Sir David Amess."
The prosecutor told jurors: "In Ali Harbi Ali's world, he has done nothing wrong.
"But you live in the real world, and in the real world you cannot take the law into your hands, hence he has no defence to the charge of murder."
Tracy Ayling QC, defending, told jurors that the defendant's case was that he acted to "save lives" in Syria.
She said: "His purpose was, as he puts it now, to save lives at the expense of Sir David's but also his own."
Jurors were told Ali had no mental health issues and he accepted much of the evidence against him.
Following this afternoon's verdict, Director of Public Prosecutions Max Hill QC said the murder was "the most appalling tragedy", particularly for the Amess family, and an "attack on democracy".
He said: "I'm obviously pleased that at the end of what must have been a very difficult trial for Sir David Amess's family, justice has been served and this individual will now pay the price for his crimes."
Ali will be sentenced on Wednesday.
