Milford Police Address Mall Security After Westfield Threat Surfaces

By Heather Doyle and Brian McCready, Patch Staff

A Somalia-based terror group has apparently called for attacks on shopping centers run by Westfield Group, which owns three malls located in Connecticut including the one in Milford.

Milford Police Chief Keith Mello said the department is aware of the video and has addressed security at the mall in light of the terror video, reports Jill Dion, editor of the Milford Mirror.

Mello stressed that no credible threats have been made against the Milford mall, located at 1201 Boston Post Road.

Mello also said security at the Westfield Connecticut Post mall has been a priority for many years, Dion reports. Mello urged Mlford residents to report suspicious activity if they see anything to police.

The threat surfaced in the form of a video specifically urging attacks on the Mall of America in Minnesota, West Edmonton Mall in Canada, and two shopping centers in the London area, all owned by Australian-based Westfield, according to The Independent.

However, the masked man in the video, purportedly from Al-Shabaab, a Somalia-based extremist group that is linked to Al-Qaeda, encourages attacks on all Westfield malls.

“Can you imagine what a dedicated mujahedeen in the West could do to the American and Jewish-owned shopping centres across the world?” he says.The threat encourages an attack similar to one in Kenya in 2013 that lasted several days and left 67 people dead, according to the report.

While their “policy is to not publicly discuss security procedures,” Westfield said their “heads of security in the US and UK continue to coordinate their activities with police and government agencies. As usual significant resources continue to be devoted to security arrangements in our shopping centres and they continue to operate as normal.