Update: According to The Telegraph, London Bridge attacker Usman Khan, 28, was a convicted terrorist who was released from prison in December 2018 - less than seven years into a 16-year sentence for a plot to bomb the London Stock Exchange.

He was also a student and personal friend of notorious Islamist hate preacher, Anjem Choudary, whose private cell phone number was stored in Khan's phone at the time of his initial arrest.

Khan was one of a series of Al-Muhajiroun connected terrorists to be released over a six-month period beginning in the Autumn of 2018. He was known to have attended a series of Al-Muhajiroun protests and street stalls in the Midlands area prior to his arrest. Before his conviction for the LSE terror plot, police had previously raided his home in Tunstall over concerns about his links to Choudary. -The Telegraph

Usman Khan

"All these years later, and Anjem Choudary's one-time acolytes are still butchering members of the public on our streets," said terrorism expert, Dr. Paul Stott.

"Usman Khan was a loyal and integral member of Choudary’s inner-circle and we know him to have been highly regarded by Choudary."

Khan — a British citizen born in the UK and of Pakistani origin — left school with no qualifications after spending part of his late teens in Pakistan, where he lived with his mother when she became ill.​ On his return to the UK, he started preaching extremism on the internet and attracted a significant following. In January 2012, Khan pleaded guilty to engaging in conduct in preparation for acts of terrorism contrary to section 5(1) of the UK’s Terrorism Act 2006. Khan was among nine men charged with conspiracy to bomb high-profile London targets in the run-up to Christmas in 2010. At the time, the men were described as an Al Qaeda-inspired group that wanted to send mail bombs to various targets and launch a "Mumbai-style" atrocity. At the time of his arrest, Khan lived in Stoke-on-Trent, a city in central England. -Dawn

Meanwhile, The Mirror reports that the tusk-wielding hero who helped stop the attack using a 5' Narwhal Tusk he grabbed off a wall is a Polish chef named only as Lukasz, who immigrated to the UK.

The man armed with a Narwhal tusk who helped to stop the terrorist attack yesterday on London bridge was a Polish chef called Łukasz, reports @thetimes pic.twitter.com/VHEWvhRxT5 — Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) November 30, 2019

According to friends, he was working at Fishmongers' Hall when Khan, 28, began attacking attendees at a University of Cambridge conference on prisoner rehabilitation. Kahn, who was wearing a fake suicide vest, killed two and injured three - including Lukasz.

“Everybody run! There’s a terrorist on the bridge!”



Lukasz: Get me the tusk



🇵🇱🇵🇱🇵🇱 — Jack Posobiec 🇺🇸 (@JackPosobiec) November 30, 2019

Khan was killed by the police.

On Saturday the Queen praised the "brave individuals who put their own lives at risk to selflessly help and protect others."

Prime Minister Boris Johnson, meanwhile, has pledged to bolster prison sentences for criminals who commit serious and violent offenses, and that people convicted of terrorism should not be allowed out of prison early.

"It’s clear to me this guy was out—he served half of his sentence, he was out on automatic, early release—and I have long said that this system isn’t working" said Johnson, standing near the scene of the incident.

"It does not make sense for us as a society to put terrorists, people convicted of terrorist offenses, out on early release. We argue that people should, that terrorists serve the term of their sentence. That’s my immediate takeaway from this and why we’re working on increasing the sentences for serious, violent offenders," he added. "I think that the practice of automatic, early release where you cut a sentence in half and let really serious, violent offenders out early simply isn’t working, and you’ve some very good evidence of how that isn’t working, I am afraid, with this case."

***

A quick-thinking bystander who was inside London's Fishmonger's Hall when a deadly terrorist attack began grabbed a 5' narwhal tusk off the wall and helped subdue a knife-wielding man who killed two pedestrians on London Bridge.

The attacker, said to be a recently-released terrorist prisoner believed to be wearing a fake suicide vest and a tracking tag, was taken down by the tusk-wielding hero and a man with a fire extinguisher before police shot him dead.

Sources have told Sky News the suspect in the London Bridge attack was a recently-released terrorist prisoner believed to have been wearing a tag — Sky News Breaking (@SkyNewsBreak) November 29, 2019

"A guy who was with us at Fishmongers Hall took a 5' narwhale [sic] tusk from the wall and went out to confront the attacker," tweeted Amy Coop.

A guy who was with us at Fishmongers Hall took a 5’ narwhale tusk from the wall and went out to confront the attacker. You can see him standing over the man (with what looks like a white pole) in the video. We were trying to help victims inside but that man’s a hero #LondonBridge — Amy Coop (@theamycoop) November 29, 2019

Yup — Amy Coop (@theamycoop) November 29, 2019

When you wrestle a knife from a terrorist but remembered you picked up for the lads tonight. #LondonBridge #LondonBridgeAttack #LondonBridgeIncident #londonshooting pic.twitter.com/rpo8ZO5fgZ — RWK (@firedeathpony) November 29, 2019

After police stepped in:

Terrorism attacker lay dead on #Londonbridge 💪🇬🇧



Brilliant work by armed police pic.twitter.com/ScOqsyOFX6 — London Crime LDN (@CrimeLdn) November 29, 2019