British eatery bombing suspect has home searched

British police and intelligence officials searched a house in southwest England on Friday to try to determine what drove a young Muslim convert with a history of mental illness to walk into a busy restaurant with two bombs.

Armed officers raided the home of 22-year-old Nicky Reilly in Plymouth late Thursday. Police said Friday that the search was continuing.

Reilly was in a hospital under armed guard and being treated for facial injuries after a device he was carrying blew up Thursday in a bathroom at Giraffe, a popular family restaurant in Exeter, 180 miles (290 kilometers) southwest of London and about 40 miles (60 kilometers) from his home. Another explosive device was found nearby and disarmed by bomb-disposal experts.

Police would not confirm reports that the devices were homemade nail bombs.

Police late Thursday took the unusual step of naming Reilly, who has not been charged, and releasing a photograph of the stocky, 6 foot 3 inch (1.9 meter) young man. Devon and Cornwall Police said Reilly had been manipulated, and appealed for help tracking his movements.

"Our investigation so far indicates that Reilly, who has a history of mental illness, has adopted the Islamic faith," Deputy Chief Constable Tony Melville told reporters.

"We believe that despite his weak and vulnerable state, he was preyed upon, radicalized and taken advantage of."

Police said the incident did not appear to be part of a wider plot, although they cautioned that the investigation was ongoing.

London police said they had sent a small team of counterterrorism officers to provide support for the investigation. The British Broadcasting Corp. reported that the country's domestic intelligence service, MI5, was also on the case.

Scott Allen, 19, who lives in the apartment below Reilly's in Plymouth, said the young man appeared introverted and rarely spoke.

"I would say they picked on him because of his vulnerability," Allen said. "He had always been a follower and had always wanted friends."

Syed Lutfur Rahman, chairman of the Islamic Center in Plymouth, said police had called him to offer protection for the center in case of a backlash against local Muslims. They also asked him if he knew Reilly.

"I said I didn't know him. I don't know if he's been to the center," Rahman said. "But I don't recognize him."

Terrorism-related arrests have become regular in Britain since the Sept. 11 attacks and the July 2005 suicide bombings that killed 52 commuters in London. Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said last month that authorities were monitoring 2,000 suspects and 30 active plots, and that the threat was growing.

The largely rural southwest of England is not considered a major terrorist target, although animal-rights militants have detonated a series of bombs in the region over the last quarter century.

Last month, a 19-year-old Muslim convert from Bristol in western England was charged with intending to commit a terrorist act using an improvised explosive device. Police say Andrew Philip Michael Ibrahim was found with a peroxide-based explosive, along with ball bearings, air gun pellets, nails, screws, circuitry, batteries and electric bulb filaments.