Melbourne terror plotters caught buying bomb-making equipment at Bunnings Warehouse

Abdullah Chaarani, front, and Ahmed Mohamed, rear, shopping at Chemist Warehouse in Campbellfield.

Ahmed Mohamed strolls casually through the front doors of the Bunnings Warehouse store in Broadmeadows in Melbourne's northwest like he is any other customer.

But what fellow shoppers did not know at the time is that the 27-year-old was shopping for everything he needed to carry out what would have been Australia's deadliest terror attack in the name of Islamic State.

It was December 22, 2016, days out from the planned New Year's Eve attack at Melbourne's Federation Square where Mohamed, Abdullah Chaarani, 29, and brothers Hamza Abbas, 24, and Ibrahim Abbas, 25, wanted to behead people and set off bombs.

Abdullah Chaarani, front, and Ahmed Mohamed, rear, shopping at Chemist Warehouse in Campbellfield.

In CCTV footage released on Wednesday by Victorian Supreme Court Justice Christopher Beale, Mohamed can be seen buying 700 nail gun cartridges, taps and pipe from the Bunnings store to prepare his bomb.

His co-conspirators, who are each facing life in prison after being convicted of plotting the terror attack, were also filmed shopping at Chemist Warehouse and a Boating, Camping and Fishing store where they purchased machetes.

While Justice Beale agreed to release the CCTV footage of the terror plotters' shopping spree, he banned the release of additional footage deemed potentially distressing to the public.

That footage, captured on City of Melbourne cameras, showed the men wandering around a packed Federation Square — one of Melbourne's busiest tourist locations — scouting the location for the best way to inflict maximum damage.

"For some people, it might be distressing, to say the least, to see broadcast over the media footage of them near the accused men, for instance, at Federation Square when, on the prosecution case, they're plotting mass slaughter," Justice Beale told the court.

"What comes to mind immediately is a little girl playing in Federation Square next to her mother or some adult who's supervising her and sitting very close to … the four men chatting.

Ahmed Mohamed at the counter of the Broadmeadows Bunnings Warehouse store on December 22, 2016.

"Let's say if you — I don't know if you've got children but if you'd been at Federation Square and your child had been playing next to these fellows who were plotting this mass slaughter and, you know, it wasn't an infant but even if you pixelated the faces, that child or that parent of that child would be able to join the dots."

Chaarani earlier told the court he was disgusted by his part in the plot and that he "realised what an idiot" he had been for planning violent jihad.

He said he cried when his father visited him in prison.

"It was the most embarrassing, most humiliating moment of my life," Chaarani said.

"He said 'you embarrassed me, you shocked me, this is not my son'."

He had begun a path to reforming his views about Islam, including by reading books recommended by imams and through his father, admitting he'd never picked up a book before and learned only from extremist propaganda.

A formal prison deradicalisation program is not available until after sentencing, but Chaarani revealed he wished he could have started it the day he was arrested.

Asked by his lawyer Patrick Tehan if he was sorry, Chaarani replied "you have no idea".

"I'm sorry for the havoc I've caused to my family foremost (and) to the legal system," he said.

Mohamed chats with staff before purchasing 700 nail gun cartridges.

Mohamed and Chaarani have both renounced Islamic State. Mohamed said he'd been swayed by Islamic State propaganda, particularly IS videos.

The young man who had blond hair, an earring and did things Muslims weren't supposed to do said he didn't even know how to pray.

He said he now hates the terror group, but he "felt like a chicken" if he had backed out of the plan.

"I wanted to be the hero of the group … I wanted to be the cool guy of the group."

He said he hopes to study a Bachelor of Arts in Islamic Studies so he can learn properly about Islam.

Mohamed, Chaarani and Hamza Abbas are due to be sentenced on November 29. Ibrahim Abbas pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 24 years prison, with 20 years before he's eligible for parole.