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PARIS (AP) — Certainly one of three People acclaimed as heroes for tackling an alleged Islamic State gunman aboard a Paris-bound prepare testified on the man’s trial Friday that he tried to kill him.
Alek Skarlatos instructed the Paris court docket that he yanked a pistol from the attacker’s hand, turned it on him and pulled the set off however that the gun didn’t hearth.
“I used to be truthfully making an attempt my finest to kill or restrain him,” Skarlatos stated.
The assault suspect, Ayoub El Khazzani, faces a most sentence of life in jail if he’s convicted of tried terrorist homicide. The 31-year-old Moroccan is being tried with three suspected accomplices.
The recollections in court docket this week from passengers who disarmed the attacker on the prepare from Amsterdam have highlighted the split-second decisions that foiled what may have develop into a mass slaughter. The passengers’ heroics on Aug. 21, 2015 impressed Clint Eastwood to direct a Hollywood film reenacting the dramatic occasions: “The 15:17 to Paris.”
Skarlatos and two different longtime mates have been vacationing collectively. They grew up collectively in California. One of many mates, Spencer Stone, managed to pin down the attacker in a stranglehold. Skarlatos moved in, too, joined by one other passenger as soon as the gunman was on the bottom.
He “was surprisingly tough to regulate,” Skarlatos testified.
With the attacker beneath management, the prepare rerouted to Arras, in northern France, the place El Khazzani was arrested.
Authorities say El Khazzani boarded the prepare in Brussels armed with the Kalashnikov, 9 clips with 30 rounds every, an computerized pistol and a cutter.
As soon as aboard the prepare, El Khazzani lingered in a restroom between vehicles, the place two different passengers confronted him, after which emerged bare-chested along with his weapons.
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