Police Debate if London Plotters Were Suicide Bombers, or Dupes

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Police Debate if London Plotters Were Suicide Bombers, or Dupes
By ELAINE SCIOLINO and DON VAN NATTA Jr.
Published: July 27, 2005
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/27/international/europe/27suicide.html?ei=5094&en=9d7dbf0225525aae&hp=&ex=1122523200&adxnnl=1&partner=homepage&adxnnlx=1122444145-FnU6akR7TaJ2ABc6rsH7pw


" in recent days, some police officials are increasingly considering the possibility that the men did not plan to commit suicide and were duped into dying.

Investigators raising doubts about the suicide assumption have cited evidence to support this theory. Each of the four men who died in the July 7 attacks purchased round-trip railway tickets from Luton to London. Germaine Lindsay's rented car left in Luton had a seven-day parking sticker on the dashboard.

A large quantity of explosives were stored in the trunk of that car, perhaps for another attack. Another bomber had just spent a large sum to repair his car. The men carried driver's licenses and other ID cards with them to their deaths, unusual for suicide bombers.

In addition, none left behind a note, videotape or Internet trail as suicide bombers have done in the past. And the bombers' families were baffled by what seemed to be their decisions to kill themselves.

While some of these clues could be seen as the work of men intent on covering their trail, some investigators increasingly believe that the men may have been conned into carrying the bombs onto the trains and leaving them, thinking they were going to explode minutes later."