The ISIS teen who plotted a terror attack on a Taylor Swift concert has been pictured for the first time as neighbours say he completely changed his look recently.
The 19-year-old ISIS fanatic has been identified as Beran A., who lived in a newly-built end-terraced house in Ternitz, nearly 50 miles south of Vienna, where he spent his childhood.
A few years ago, Beran A.’s parents – who immigrated to Austria from North Macedonia – moved into a new-built house in the Neunkirchen district of Ternitz with him and his younger sister.
Ternitz residents told local media that he used to be a ‘harmless boy next door’ in jeans and sneakers, who was born in Austria and attended a local school.
But Beran A. had changed recently, according to his neighbours, coinciding with his pledge of allegiance to ISIS in early July. He grew a long beard and was often spotted wearing a long-sleeved cotton shirt, with a new picture of him showing him posing with huge zombie knives and an ISIS flag.
The 19-year-old was arrested in Ternitz, south of Vienna, Wednesday morning while a second teen, aged 17, was detained in the Austrian capital in the afternoon, according to director-general for public safety Franz Ruf. The two inhaled laughing gas before planning their terror acts, according to Heute.
Taylor Swift was due to perform in front of an estimated 170,000 fans on August 8, 9, and 10 at Vienna’s Ernst-Happel-Stadion, but the shows were cancelled last night.
Beran A. and his accomplice had planned to attack Swift’s concert venue by driving into the crowd outside at 4pm today before attacking them with knives and machetes and detonating a suicide bomb.
Resident Mara T. told Austrian outlet Kurier that she had last seen the terror suspect on Tuesday morning, adding: ‘He looked like how you would imagine a sleeper agent for a terrorist cell.’
Another neighbour, Nicole, said the family was ‘inconspicuous and quiet’ and that they didn’t cause any problems. She said that Beran A.’s mother speaks German ‘very well’, but that the father’s language skills were not as good.
Nicole said the family even helped her clear away debris thrown against her terraced house during a storm.
But not everyone had such a positive experience with the family, as neighbours Mara T. and Dieter S. reveal.
They said they got into arguments with Beran A.’s family when loading and unloading their car in front of their neighbour’s house.
Until two weeks ago, Beran A. had worked in the same stainless steel plant in Ternitz as his father.
He was doing an apprenticeship as a retail salesman in the factory, where he had access to the plant’s laboratory, including various chemicals.
Behind the bright white walls of the family home in Ternitz, bomb disposal experts secured chemicals to produce the explosive triacetone triperoxide (TATP), which Beran A. – who is said to be the mastermind behind the plot – is said to have already experimented with.
TATP is often used by ISIS in terror attacks and requires acetone as well as hydrogen peroxide, which officials confirmed was found in the house.
The head of the Directorate of State Security and Intelligence, Omar Haijawi-Pirchner, said Beran A. was ‘clearly radicalized in the direction of the Islamic State and thinks it is right to kill infidels’.
Beran A.’s parents and sister reportedly are currently on holiday in North Macedonia, but police is expected to question the parents over their son upon their return.
Several people close to the terror suspect knew of his attack plans, according to Austrian media reports.
Beran A., who reportedly planned the attack for five years, has been arrested alongside a 17-year-old.
The suspects – who allegedly radicalised themselves online – took ‘concrete preparatory actions’ for an attack – with Beran A. ‘focused’ on Swift’s Vienna concert, Ruf confirmed.
Beran A. had quit his job and announced that he ‘still had big plans’ on July 25, Ruf revealed at a press conference today, adding that the teen also ‘significantly changed his appearance’ and that the 17-year-old had recently broken up with his girlfriend. ‘There has been a clear social change,’ Ruf added.
The 17-year-old regularly visited a mosque in Vienna’s Meidling district and carried ISIS stickers in his wallet when he was arrested on Wednesday afternoon, outlet Heute reports.
But the teenager claims he only visited the Bosnian mosque because his ‘girlfriend at the time lived in the area’. He broke up with this girlfriend recently, according to the Austrian head of state security.
Austrian media reported the suspects’ plans included driving a car into groups of Swifties expected to gather outside the venue before attacking with machetes and knives. They had reportedly planned to launch their attack at 4pm today.
Beran A. fully confessed to his plans to ‘kill as many people as possible outside the concert venue’, Austrian security officials said.
His planned terror attack was supposed to end with him detonating his homemade bomb and killing himself in the process, according to the Austrian Heute newspaper.
Director-general for public safety Ruf confirmed today that ‘explosives were manufactured’ at the suspect’s home after local media reported that Beran A. had stolen chemicals from his former workplace, a metal processing company also in Ternitz, to build a bomb.
Beran A. – who was living in his parents’ house along with another man – was arrested on Wednesday after police raided the home, according to Kronen Zeitung.
A bomb squad found chemical substances, fluids as well as ‘explosive devices and technical equipment’, Ruf said, after raiding the home and it is believed that the 19-year-old stole these from his workplace.
Ruf confirmed at a press conference today that the ‘preparatory action’ in the home in Ternitz focused on the manufacturing of explosives.
Among the substances was hydrogen peroxide, which Ruf said is used to create explosives and he confirmed that ‘explosives were manufactured’.
The suspects reportedly planned to ram a car into fans outside the stadium as it is well known that those who missed out on tickets will still come to the venue of Swift’s shows to listen from outside, like a week ago in Munich when 40,000 ticketless fans gathered on hills outside the Olympic Stadium.
Neither Beran A. nor the second suspect appeared to have a ticket to any of the shows and instead planned to focus the attack on fans standing outside the stadium.
Kurier also cited several sources who claimed the 17-year-old suspect had gotten jobs as security guards at the concert a few days ago, suggesting this could have facilitated the attack.
The newspaper also reported that the 17-year-old is said to be a major player in the gang war in Vienna, with police issuing a wanted notice for the boy in relation to a fight earlier this month.
Beran A. intensely prepared for and ‘focused on his planned terror attack’ since quitting his job on July 25, according to Ruf.
He also had blank ammunition, €21,000 (£18,000) in counterfeit money and a blue police flashing light and siren he wanted to use to get to the venue undeterred, German tabloid Bild reports.
According to Austrian media reports, Beran A. and his accomplice wanted to launch the attack at 4pm today, when the outside of the stadium would have been packed with thousands of fans waiting to get inside as security guards were due to unlock the gates at this time.
Beran A.’s plan reportedly was to attack the blue flashing police light to his VW Beetle and to disguise himself as a police officer to get as close to the stadium as possible before running over as many Swifties as he can, before attacking them with knives and machetes and detonating his suicide bomb.
During his interrogation, Beran A. gave a full confession, but reportedly showed no remorse for his terror plans.
‘The suspects had concrete and detailed plans to create a tragedy of the same magnitude as the Paris, Manchester and Moscow attacks, also at a concert, with many people, and to leave a blood bath behind,’ Austrian chancellor Karl Nehammer said at a news conference this afternoon.
‘It is really inconceivable to think about what immeasurable damage a successful attack could have created,’ he added.
The name of the second suspect, aged 17, has not yet been released. He is said to have Austrian nationality but Turkish and Croatian roots and reportedly was in ‘intense contact’ with Beran A. over the last few days.
While it has been reported that the second suspect would have likely been able to gain access to the venue due to his new job with the facilities company, it is unclear what horrors he wanted to unleash inside the stadium.
A 15-year-old Austrian with Turkish heritage has also been detained and is currently being questioned after police found that he had communicated with both suspects.
Beran A. had uploaded an oath of allegiance to the current leader of the Islamic State group (ISIS) to an internet account in early July, police said.
A video of this pledge of allegiance as well as a video confessing responsibility for the attack has been seized by police.
Authorities also found Islamic State group and al-Qaida material at the home of the second suspect, a 17-year-old Austrian.
He was employed a few days ago by a company providing services at the venue for the concerts, and was arrested by special police forces near the stadium.
The 17-year-old reportedly denies the terror accusations against him. He told police that him and Beran A. ‘just wanted to drive around’.
He reportedly spoke to Beran A. on the phone for an hour on July 7 – ‘but only because we were friends’, not because they were planning a terror attack.
The teenager even stayed over at Beran A.’s house in Ternitz on August 2, according to Heute.
Law enforcement sources told ABC News information about the threat to the shows originated with U.S. intelligence and was passed to the Austrians and Europol on July 25.
Ruf said: ‘The suspects were focused on the Taylor Swift concerts. We discovered that he was taking action to prepare for the attack. A clear threat has been averted.’
Officials said at a press conference that no other suspects are being sought after identifying the two teens aged 17 and 19.
Austria’s chancellor Karl Nehammer declared on X following news of the arrests: ‘Thanks to the intensive cooperation of our police and the newly established DSN (Directorate for Security and Intelligence) with foreign services, the threat was identified early on, combated, and a tragedy was prevented.’
Commending the police and intelligence services for preventing a potential attack on the Swift concerts, Nehammer said: ‘We live in a time in which violent means are being used to attack our western way of life.
‘Islamist terrorism threatens security and freedom in many western countries. This is precisely why we will not give up our values such as freedom and democracy, but will defend them even more vehemently.
‘These values are the foundation of our society and make us resilient against extremism and terrorism. It is important to remain vigilant, stand together and take decisive action against Islamism.’
‘The situation was serious, the situation is serious,’ Austria’s Interior Minister Gerhard Karner said at a press conference today.
He added: ‘But we can also say that a tragedy could be prevented.’
‘The danger posed by Islamist extremism significantly increased in Europe following the devastating terror attack by Hamas on Israel. […] Austria was and is no exception here.
Karner said that the terror alert level in Austria had been raised to four since October 7, the second highest level.
‘Large concerts are a preferred target for Islamist assassins,’ he explained, referencing the attack in the Bataclan in Paris in 2015, the Ariana Grande concert in Manchester 2018 as well as the Moscow City Hall attack earlier this year.
British band Coldplay is due to play four shows in Vienna later this month from August 21 to August 25, but it is unclear whether these concerts will go ahead in light of the foiled terror attacks.
Swift’s concert promoter Barracuda Music posted a statement which read: ‘Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour Vienna Shows Cancelled Due to Government Officials Confirmation of Planned Terrorist Attack.
‘With confirmation from government officials of a planned terrorist attack at Ernst Happel Stadium, we have no choice but to cancel the three scheduled shows for everyone’s safety.
‘All tickets will be automatically refunded within the next 10 business days.’
Ruf initially said that there would be a special focus on entry checks and concertgoers should plan to arrive in plenty of time.
The shows were expected to be attended by 65,000 concertgoers per day, with an additional 30,000 fans outside of the area, police said.
Swift is expected to perform at London’s Wembley stadium in five concerts between August 15 and 20 to close the European leg of her record-setting Eras Tour.
Policing minister Diana Johnson said Scotland Yard will look at ‘all the intelligence’ ahead of Swift’s UK shows.
