A court in Australia has sentenced a man to eight years in prison for terrorism after he lit bushfires and pledged allegiance to Isis.
Aran Sherani, 22, was seen smiling after justice Mandy Fox of the Supreme Court of Victoria gave him the sentence on Thursday, ABC News reported.
A jury last year found Sherani guilty of preparing for a terrorist act based on a video that he shot of himself in 2021. In it, Sherani, then 18, pleads allegiance to Isis while holding a knife up to the camera and bragging that he was on the run from police.
Though the jury acquitted him of attempting to commit terrorist acts by lighting the bushfires, he pleaded guilty to being a terror group member.
The court heard that Sherani was an informal member of Isis or had taken steps to become a member between January and March 2021. He possessed, accessed and engaged with material including propaganda videos of acts of terrorism such as beheadings and executions. The videos were found on his phone, according to reports.
Ms Fox said Sherani intended to threaten police with the knife he held in the video rather than actually use it to stab them. “While the plan remained afoot, you were committed to its execution,” Ms Fox said in her sentencing remarks.
“However, you voluntarily abandoned the plan and the ultimate arrest was made without resistance.”
Ms Fox said videos of Sherani lighting the bushfires showed the lengths he was prepared to go to join the group. “You embraced a depraved ideology and sought to advance the ideology through your own actions,” the judge said.
Ms Fox said Sherani was interested in the Kurdish plight due to his unstable family background, which led to him getting radicalised online during the Covid pandemic.
Sherani told the court in July he denounced the terrorist group and no longer believed Isis would help the Kurdish people, according to The Age.
“There remains a risk that you could again become radicalised and become dangerous,” the judge said.
Sherani was sentenced to eight years in prison but will be eligible for parole after six years.
His older brother, Ari Sherani, who allegedly helped him film the videos, was also charged with terrorism-related offences but was later acquitted.
