Ex-solider Daniel Khalife 'delivered package to Iranian agents in Turkey before prison escape'

Former British soldier Daniel Khalife is said to have promised his Iranian handler that he would stay in the military for over 25 years and do whatever was required of him

A former British soldier accused of spying for Iran secretly collected the names of special forces personnel and delivered a "package" to his handlers in Turkey, a court has heard.

Daniel Khalife, 23, who later allegedly escaped from Wandsworth prison where he was being held over the charges, is on trial accused of collecting secret military information between May 2019 and January 2022. Khalife, raised in Kingston, south-west London by his Iranian-born mother, joined the army in September 2018, two weeks before his 17th birthday. He is said to have later promised his handler that he would stay in the military for over 25 years and do whatever was required of him, Woolwich Crown Court heard on Wednesday.

Khalife also contacted MI6 saying he wanted to be a "double agent" and later told detectives his contact with the Iranians was all a double bluff, a jury has been told. Prosecutor Mark Heywood KC said Khalife first made contact with Iran in April 2019. He travelled to Istanbul from August 4-10 2020, Mr Heywood told the jury, adding that Khalife was in Turkey originally "with a view to go onwards".

He said: "That was, says the prosecution, an attempt at least to meet, engage, face-to-face directly. The original attempt was to go to Iran." In a message from a phone accessed, Khalife said he had "delivered a package to his handler", the court heard, with Mr Heywood adding: "He's clearly reporting to a third party what happened in Istanbul."

Khalife was allegedly paid in cash by the Iranian intelligence service, picking up £1,500 in a dog poo bag in Mill Hill Park, north London. He is accused of a second £1,000 cash collection from Kensal Green Cemetery, north west London, in October 2021.

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."

In June 2021 he took a photo of a list of soldiers, including some in the Special Air Service (SAS) and Special Boat Service (SBS), the court was told. Khalife took details from a WhatsApp group called Brew Room Boys, and then logged on to an internal HR system for booking leave to try to find their first names, jurors heard.

Mr Heywood said: "The details on the spreadsheet included the promotion details for all sorts of units in the Army, including special forces who operated, as you might imagine, on a different basis to other parts of the armed services and ordinarily do not publish their membership or ranks or identity for very good, security-related reasons." Mr Heywood added: "He was clearly researching and gathering and recording that information."

Jurors were shown a photograph from Khalife's iPhone of a handwritten list of 15 soldiers that he had made, including their service number, rank, initials, surname and unit, including the SAS and SBS. 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.

In April that year Khalife was granted the second highest level of Nato security, one below "cosmic top secret". 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." The jury has already heard that Khalife undertook specialist training in Blandford Forum, in Dorset for a year from 2019. After he was arrested over the allegations, Khalife is accused of escaping from Wandsworth Prison by strapping himself to the underside of a food delivery truck on September 6 2023.

As well as the alleged prison escape, he denies a charge of gathering, publishing or communicating information that might be useful to an enemy, namely Iranian intelligence, contrary to the Official Secrets Act between May 1 2019 and January 6 2022. He also denies having elicited or attempted to elicit personal information about armed forces personnel that was likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism from a Ministry of Defence administration system on August 2 2021.

The trial continues.