This article is more than 6 months old

This article is more than 6 months old

Footage of Salman Abedi scoping out Manchester Arena during a Take That concert, days before his suicide bomb murdered 22 people, has been shown to a jury.

Abedi can be seen looking at the crowds gathering before the event and the long queues at the box office, yards from the spot where four days later he would return to detonate a rucksack bomb packed with shrapnel.

His younger brother, Hashem Abedi, 22, is on trial at the Old Bailey accused of helping to plan the attack in the City Rooms, the foyer where Salman detonated his device, killing 22 bystanders and injuring hundreds more at the end of an Ariana Grande show on 22 May 2017.

CCTV footage shows Salman Abedi travelling to the venue, spending more than a minute in the City Rooms before leaving for the nearby Arndale shopping centre.

There he buys four nine-volt batteries and a large blue Kangol suitcase, used to transport his bomb-making equipment to the flat he had rented out in the city centre, after leaving his brother with family in Libya and returning alone to the UK on 18 May.

Earlier he was caught on CCTV leaving the flat in Granby Row at about 6pm.

The hooded figure, wearing jogging bottoms and white trainers, is seen moving through rush-hour traffic, past commuters scurrying for trains as he travels to Victoria Station.

Abedi also swaps his sim card between phones and takes an untraced international call during the visit, where he walks the perimeter of the arena before going inside to the City Rooms.

Afterwards he takes a taxi to a local Screwfix shop to buy electrical cable, halogen bulbs and rolls of tape before returning to his flat at 8.04pm.

Jurors heard the next day he took the suitcase to Devell House, a block of flats in Rusholme, south Manchester, where on 14 April the brothers had left a Nissan Micra, used to store bomb-making chemicals and equipment, until Salman Abedi returned from Libya to carry out the final stage of the plan.

There he loads the suitcase and is seen struggling to drag the heavy case up steps back at the city-centre apartment, where he assembled the device, it is alleged.

Hashem Abedi has told the jury he is not an extremist and had no idea of his brother’s plan. He denies 22 counts of murder, one of attempted murder encompassing the injured survivors, and conspiring with his brother to cause explosions.

The trial continues.