Golders Green knifeman walks away from London court with suspended prison sentence

Gabriel Abdullah, a 34-year-old man who in January threatened staff at a kosher supermarket with a knife in London’s Golders Green, was handed two concurrent suspended sentences at Harrow Crown Court, according to media reports from earlier this week.  

Abdullah was sentenced to 18 months imprisonment, suspended for two years, and 12 months imprisonment, suspended for two years, according to GB News. 

“Suspended sentences are custodial sentences where the offender does not have to go to prison provided that they commit no further offences and comply with any requirements imposed,” according to the UK’s Sentencing Council.

Abdullah, who had shouted antisemitic abuse and demanded supermarket staff answer at knife-point their view of the Israel-Hamas war, was ordered to take a 9 month alcohol treatment program and 30 days of rehab, according to Jewish News.

Gary Mond, Chairman of the UK's National Jewish Assembly told the Jerusalem Post "This sentence, if one can even call it that, will dent the confidence of the Jewish community in Britain's justice system, already very low, still further. Abdullah should now be serving time in prison. His behaviour could easily have had tragic vonsequences. At the same time, those who prevented a potentially fatal attack ought to be praised and indeed honoured."

Hate crime or too much to drink?

In May, Abdullah pled guilty to causing affray and being in possession of a knife. Police had originally planned to charge Abdullah with a hate crime, but the charges were later amended, according to the Jewish Chronicle. 

Abdullah’s barrister had claimed at an earlier trial that he was self-medicating his paranoid schizophrenia with alcohol.

“Mental health contributed to this offence,” Matthew Ness told the court. “Mr. Abdullah said his mental health issues had never caused him to leave the house with a knife before, and he attributed this to a very high alcohol intake.”