Beran A planned to target Swifties outside Vienna’s Ernst Happel Stadium with knives or homemade explosives in a plot that was thwarted – but Austrian authorities still cancelled Swift’s three performances in August 2024
An Austrian court has found a man guilty of plotting to attack a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna.
The state court in Wiener Neustadt convicted the 21-yea- old defendant, an Austrian national identified only as Beran A under Austrian privacy laws, on charges including those connected to the concert plot, according to the Austria Press Agency.
His defence solicitor confirmed he admitted to the charges relating to the concert conspiracy on the opening day of his trial last month.
Although the plot was foiled, Austrian authorities cancelled Swift’s three scheduled performances in the country scheduled for August 2024.
In brief closing remarks to the court before it retired to deliberate on a verdict on Thursday, Beran A said: “I would just like to say that I am sorry.”
The court heard that Beran A had intended to target concertgoers outside the Ernst Happel Stadium using knives or homemade explosives.
Tens of thousands of Taylor Swift devotees, known as Swifties, had made their way to Austria to attend the shows on the American superstar’s record-breaking Eras Tour.
Left heartbroken by the cancellations, many fans congregated in the heart of Vienna to swap friendship bracelets and share their disappointment over the scrapped gigs.
