A jury has been discharged in the trial of an Uber driver accused of plotting a sword attack on police outside Buckingham Palace.



Two unarmed officers sustained cuts to the hand when they fought to disarm Mohiussunnath Chowdhury outside the palace on 25 August last year, the Old Bailey heard.

He had written a suicide note to his sister expressing his hatred for the Queen before driving to the palace and deliberately crashing his Toyota Prius into traffic cones to attract the attention of the officers, who were passing in a police van, the jury was told.

When officers approached the car, Chowdhury allegedly said: “It’s all a bit fucked up.” Two officers grappled through the car windows to disarm him and he was eventually subdued with CS gas and dragged out of the vehicle.

The defendant, of Luton, Bedfordshire, denied preparing acts of terrorism, claiming he only wanted to get himself killed. He told the court he was upset at the British government’s role in arming Saudi Arabia and felt responsible for the deaths of innocent people in Yemen.

The jury retired on Tuesday and was given a majority direction on Thursday. On Friday, after 18 hours and 55 minutes of deliberations, it was discharged having failed to reach a verdict.

The prosecutor Tim Cray said he would seek a retrial. The judge Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb remanded Chowdhury into custody until a fresh trial on a date to be fixed.