The Vector

Norwegian teenager jailed for 20 years over UK murder plot

Police link the plot to the Foxtrot network but say they found no direct connection to Iran in this case.

A Norwegian teenager has been sentenced to 20 years in prison for conspiring to carry out a contract killing in Britain. Police said he was acting for a member of the Foxtrot criminal network, while stressing that the intended victim remains unidentified and no direct link to Iran was established.

Johannes N., 19, was sentenced on Friday following his conviction for conspiracy to murder earlier this year. He had admitted possessing firearms and ammunition but disputed that he intended to carry out the killing. The sentence concerns a plan interrupted by police in March 2025, rather than a completed attack.

Officers arrested him at a hotel in Huddersfield on 19 March 2025, two days after he arrived at Manchester Airport. They recovered two firearms and ammunition. According to Counter Terrorism Policing, investigators used CCTV and digital communications to reconstruct his movements and establish how he had collected the weapons after travelling to Britain.

Messages examined by investigators showed that he had been approached while in Norway about carrying out a shooting in the UK for a proposed payment of €25,000. Instructions covered his journey and arrangements after arrival. Euronews reported that his communications also contained directions for collecting weapons, illustrating how the preparations were organised remotely before police intervened.

At sentencing, Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb rejected his account that he would not have gone through with the plan. According to Euronews' court report, she concluded that he would have carried out the agreed killing without police intervention. She also recognised that nobody had been shot or physically harmed. His conviction followed a retrial after the first jury failed to reach a verdict, Sky News reported.

The organisation behind the commission was the Sweden-based Foxtrot network. British police say the group has been sanctioned by the UK and US over violence against Jewish and Israeli targets in Europe on behalf of Iran. That wider assessment does not establish who ordered this particular planned attack or whom it was intended to target.

Commander Helen Flanagan, who leads Counter Terrorism Policing London, explicitly said investigators had found no evidence of a direct Iranian link in this case. The identity of the intended victim has never been established. Those limitations matter: the evidence supports a conviction for a murder conspiracy and a connection to the criminal network, without resolving every question about the commission.

Flanagan said foreign states increasingly use criminal intermediaries, including people recruited online with promises of payment. Her warning described the recruits as expendable to those directing them. Police said their investigation into people suspected of helping Johannes N. obtain weapons and a stolen car remains open. Friday’s sentence therefore concludes the proceedings against him while the investigation continues.

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