Emails suggest ‘Jihadi John’ had suicidal thoughts

LONDON (AP) – Newly published emails suggest the man who became known as “Jihadi John” had suicidal thoughts before leaving Britain for Syria.

In an email exchange with the Mail on Sunday five years ago, he talked of taking too many sleeping pills and sleeping forever as a way to get away from British security service scrutiny. Mohammed Emwazi told a journalist at the newspaper in an email that he felt like a “dead man walking.”

Emwazi was revealed this week to be the Islamic State executioner known as “Jihadi John.” He has appeared in beheading videos brandishing a large knife.

Emwazi was a computer science graduate who lived in west London before leaving for Syria in 2013. He was interrogated by security services while in Britain but was never arrested or charged.