The four men whose suicide bombings failed on July 21, 2005 were given life sentences Wednesday for plotting a murderous attack on the London transport network almost two years ago.

Woolwich Crown Court, in southeast London, sentenced all four suicide bombers involved in the failed attack of July 21, 2005 to jail for life. They will serve a minimum 40 years.

Muktar Said Ibrahim, 29, Yassin Omar, 26, Ramzi Mohammed, 25, and Hussain Osman, 28, were found guilty of conspiracy to murder by the same court. Their attack was meant to replicate caused on July 7 of that same year by suicide attacks on the London transport network that killed 52 passengers and injured 700 hundred others.

Two more co-defendants face a retrial after the jury made up of nine women and three men could not decide whether to convict them or not.

Mr Justice Fulford QC at Woolwich Crown Court called the bombers’ failed attack “part of an al Qaeda-inspired and controlled sequence of attacks.” The reason the bombings failed was that the homemade bombs did not function.

The remaining co-defendants are Manfo Kwaku Asiedu, 34, from Ghana, and Adel Yahya, 24, originally from Ethiopia.

Asiedu was accused of being a fifth would-be bomber who dumped his device. He said he was “duped” into getting involved.

The sixth defendant, Yahya, was accused by the prosecution of being involved in the planning. He has always denied his participation in the plotting or any knowledge of it.