Spy-accused ex-serviceman ‘not a young and junior soldier but resourceful man’

A man accused of passing secret information to Iran was not “merely a young and junior soldier” but “a resourceful man”, a jury has been told.

Daniel Khalife, 23, fled his Army barracks in January 2023 when he realised he would face criminal charges over allegations he passed classified information on to the Middle Eastern country’s intelligence service, Woolwich Crown Court heard.

Later, while on remand, he escaped from HMP Wandsworth in September 2023 by tying himself to the underside of a food delivery truck using bedsheets, it is claimed.

Finishing the opening of the prosecution case on Wednesday, Mark Heywood KC told the jury: “The man you are dealing with was not merely a young and junior soldier, he is a resourceful man.

“By the time he felt the net closing around him he absconded from his barracks, set himself up with the means to survive and even when he was remanded in custody managed to free himself.”

Khalife is accused of planting a fake bomb in his room at his barracks in Stafford, when he went missing for three weeks in January 2023, living in a van he had stolen from the Army site, with fake number plates he had also stolen, the jury heard.

More than £18,000 cash, some genuine and some counterfeit, was found among his belongings.

A note was left near the device, which made it clear that he knew he could soon face criminal charges, the court was told.

It said: “You can say with certainty that you will go to prison for a very long time. Your options are suicide or absconding.”

The note went on: “Once in Iran you can manage life again and travel to interesting places freely.”

Later, while being held at Wandsworth prison in September 2023, jurors were told he used his “trusted role” working in the kitchen to escape.

He used a makeshift sling formed from bedsheets to tie himself underneath the chassis of the truck.

Khalife was eventually arrested in Northolt riding a mountain bike. He also had clothes, £200 in cash, a sleeping bag and a water bottle.

Prosecutors say that Khalife played “a cynical game”, claiming he wanted to forge a career working as a double agent to help the British Security and Intelligence Services, when in fact he gathered “a very large body of restricted and classified material” to pass to Iran.

“He offered himself, he offered his service and he offered the information available to him at the time to them, he accepted money from them,” Mr Heywood told the court.

It is alleged that the information he gathered included details of officers in special forces.

Jurors were told that he took details from an internal spreadsheet related to promotions, and then went on to an internal HR system “as if to book leave” to find the soldiers’ first names.

Khalife, who was brought up in Kingston, south-west London, by his Iranian mother, joined the Army in September 2018, two weeks before his 17th birthday.

Prosecutors claim he first made contact with Iran in April 2019.

It is alleged that he travelled to Istanbul in August 2020 to “deliver a package” to Iranian intelligence, and later in December 2021 offered them “some big documents”.

By the end of August 2020, six months after he was posted to the 16th Signal Regiment in Stafford, messages showed he was willing to gather information “to order, for as long as they wanted”, the court heard.

On August 28 2020, Khalife spent an hour messaging a contact saved as “David Smith”, describing an internal military system which would identify service personnel.

He told the contact: “I won’t leave the military until you tell me to”, before adding: “25+ years.”

It is alleged he stayed in contact with Iranian handlers while posted to Fort Hood in Texas in the US between February and April 2021, where he took a series of screenshots of systems marked “secret”, including a password record sheet.

The court heard how in November 2021, Khalife made two anonymous calls to MI5 from an unregistered mobile, having earlier tried to contact MI6.

He said he had been in contact with Iran for more than two years and thought he could help the British security services, and wanted to return to his normal life.

At the same time Khalife also saved an electronic note that set out how he had decided to start his own intelligence operation to prove himself after he was told he was not eligible for higher level vetting.

The document read: “I decided to start my own intel operation to prove that I was able to do this.

“All I have ever wanted to do was something in intel.

“The whole reason I joined was to work in intel. I decided to use my connection to IR (Iran) to my advantage.”

But Mr Heywood said at the same time he was also researching flights to Iran and remained in contact with his Iranian handlers.

As well as the prison escape, Khalife is charged with gathering, publishing or communicating information that might be useful to an enemy contrary to the Official Secrets Act between May 1 2019 and January 6 2022.

In addition, he is accused of perpetrating a bomb hoax in Beaconside, Staffordshire, on or before January 2023, and eliciting or attempting to elicit personal information about armed forces personnel that was likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism on August 2 2021.

The trial continues on Thursday.