A woman named Sally Evan whose son joined Al-Shabaab in Somalia has spoken about her relief when she learned about the death of her brainwashed son in the battle as he will no longer hurt innocent people.
Slain Thomas Evan and mother Sally Evan
The mother of slain British Al-Shabaab terrorist, Thomas Evan, said that she was relieved that he was killed because he can no longer hurt innocent people.
"I think he is burning in hell for his heinous crimes" 57-year-old Sally Evan told Sunday Times. Thomas Evans was among a group of Al-Shabaab militants killed in Kenya in June 2015 in a neutralized attack in a military base.
She said she was ‘devastated and relieved at the same time’ when she received the news of her son’s death.
“Imagine discovering the death of your child on Twitter and being both devastated and relieved at the same time. Devastated because the child you brought into this world was killed after being brainwashed into pursuing a murderous cause. But relieved because the death of your child meant that he could no longer harm innocent people,” Sally recently said at an event hosted by Quilliam, a counter-terrorism organisation.
Thomas Evans moved to Somalia in early 2012 after converting to Islam and being radicalised in his early 20s, and joined Al-Shabaab. Sally said when Evans was in Somalia, he called her to say that he had married a teenage girl.
Thomas Evan as a growing child
“He gave her family an old cow so he could marry her. But at least he’s happy. I wish I could say the same, but I can’t. I’m heartbroken for him and for this young girl,” Sally Evans wrote in her diary on Christmas Eve 2012, the report indicates.
She apparently argued with her son on phone about the September 2013 deadly Westgate attack in Nairobi. She was disturbed that the son she brought up ‘in a normal way’ thought it was okay to ‘murder innocent men, women and children out shopping’.
Sally refused to obey a request from his son’s wife Sudea who called her in January 2015 to send money, saying that she didn’t want to seem to support terrorism. The next thing she knew, her other son Michael showed her a Twitter photo of a dead Evans alongside other Al-Shabaab members killed in a botched terrorist attack in Kenya about six months later.
She called Sudea to see how she was dealing with Evans’ death and says she could not believe when the her young daughter-in-law said that say she was ‘happy because he died a martyr fighting for what he believes in’