Jihadi John's past REVEALED: Masked killer was almost driven to SUICIDE before joining IS
KILLER Jihadi John contemplated committing SUICIDE before travelling to Syria to join the Islamic State, emails from the infamous militant have revealed.
Mohammed Emwazi – who was last week named as Jihadi John – described himself as a "dead man walking" and revealed that MI5 persecution was driving him to consider suicide.
Emwazi sent a series of emails to Robert Verkaik, the security editor for the Mail on Sunday, in which he described his run-ins with security services.
The correspondence from the Islamic State killer offers a shocking insight into his paranoid state of mind.
One day, I'll take as many pills as I can so that I will sleep for ever! I just want to get away from these people
Writing three years before he fled to Syria, Emwazi describes thinking about suicide.
"Sometimes I feel like a dead man walking, not fearing they (MI5) may kill me," he writes.
"Rather, fearing that one day, I'll take as many pills as I can so that I will sleep for ever! I just want to get away from these people!"
Emwazi, who has appeared in dozens of Islamic State propaganda films, including orchestrating the beheading of British and US hostages, sent the emails between December 2010 and early 2011.
The suicidal 26-year-old University of Westminster graduate describes selling his laptop online to a man he believed was working undercover for MI5.
He describes advertising his laptop on classified adverts website Gumtree, before arranging to meet a prospective buyer at Maida Vale underground station, close to his home in West London.
"When I sell anything via internet i always only write my surname in the ad…," he writes.
"I went to meet that person... so that he could have a look at the laptop & if it satisfied him then he would buy it...
"That person to my surprise didn’t even bother looking to see of the laptop works or not!!! (when you buy something, from someone you’ve never seen before you most likely would test the product!!)...
"Anyway, in a matter of seconds, I gave him the laptop (thinking that hes going to test the laptop) & he gave me the money straight-away...
"We “shacked hands” & he said “nice doing business with you Mohammed”.
"I NEVER TOLD THIS PERSON MY FIRST NAME!! & I NEVER GIVE OUT MY FIRST NAME!! IT WAS IMPOSSIBLE FOR HIM TO KNOW MY FIRST NAME!!
"I felt shocked, & paused for a few seconds as he walked away... I knew it was them!! Sometimes i feel like im a dead man walking" (sic)
The emails come amid claims Emwazi was part of a cell orchestrated by Osama Bin Laden to wreak terror on the streets of London.
The West London computer programmer is believed to have had a role in the failed July 21 bomb attacks in 2005, three weeks after the 7/7 bombings which killed 52 people and injured more than 700.
Emwazi would later travel to Tanzania in 2009 with senior Al Shabaab commander Bilal Berjawi and a third known London terrorist, Mohamed Sakr, in what the extremist threesome dubbed 'a safari holiday'.
All three were stopped by security services, who believed they intended to attend terrorist training in Somalia.
Neighbours from the West London area where Emwazi lived gave mixed comments on his family.
One described them as "nice and normal", while another said: “They are strange people - not like other people around here. He would not say hello he was unfriendly.”
Meanwhile, a former head of MI6 yesterday blasted claims security services had played a role in Emwazi's radicalisation.
Sir John Sawers, head of MI6 from 2009 to 2014, said arguments that harassment drove Emwazi to join IS were "very specious".
There has also been a renewed suggestion - from a former independent reviewer of government anti-terror laws - Emwazi could have been prevented from joining Islamic State had restrictions on suspects not been relaxed.
"Had control orders been in place, in my view there is a realistic prospect that Mohammed Emwazi, and at least two of his associates, would have been the subject of control orders with a compulsory relocation," Lord Carlile told Sky News.
Jihadi John is thought to have been responsible for the brutal killings of US journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff, American aid worker Peter Kassig, British aid workers Alan Henning and David Haines and Japanese hostages Kenji Goto and Haruna Yukawa.
Each killing was publicised in a series of highly-produced video clips.
The masked militant appeared to speak with a British accent, prompting speculation about his identity.
The killer gained his moniker after being nicknamed 'John' by a group of his hostages.
- For confidential support call the Samaritans in the UK on 08457 90 90 90 or visit a local Samaritans branch.
