Lapshyn was given a life sentence, and will serve a minimum of 40 years,[3] for a murder in Birmingham and three attempted bombings of mosques in the West Midlands.

Lapshyn's father claims his son is not a racist, and said Pavlo knew his grandmother was a member of the (largely Muslim) Tatar community.

[10] At around 10 pm on 29 April 2013, five days after his arrival in the United Kingdom, Lapshyn stabbed 82-year-old Mohammed Saleem to death as the pensioner returned from Green Lane Mosque in Small Heath.

Saleem, a father of seven and grandfather of 23 who had emigrated to the United Kingdom from Pakistan in 1957, had been walking alone near his Small Heath home when he was spotted by Lapshyn, who was carrying a knife.

[4] Local opinion was that Saleem had been murdered by a member of the anti-Islamist street protest movement, the English Defence League (EDL), after six Muslims had been convicted for attempting to bomb one of their rallies.

[15] The second was laid outside Wolverhampton Central Mosque on 28 June, but not reported until after the other two because police failed to recognise that a bomb had caused debris on a traffic island near the building until Lapshyn's arrest.

[7][16] The third bomb was placed in Tipton on 12 July and went off one hour after prayers ended, with no-one injured,[16] which coincided with the funeral of murdered Fusilier Lee Rigby, who was killed by Islamic extremists in an attack at Woolwich, London.

[17] The investigation seized and examined thousands of hours of CCTV, much of it from commercial premises along the exit route and were able to pick out a suspect, going to and from the site of the last attack using the bus network.

[3] Peter Wright QC, prosecuting, said that police searches of Lapshyn's flat had found photographs of him posing with the dagger with which he had killed Saleem, as well as white supremacist literature and video games.

Wright argued for a whole-life order;[20] however, Lapshyn was sentenced to life in imprisonment, with a minimum term of 40 years, meaning he will not be eligible for release until 2053.