Monthly Archives: September 2018

Nottingham National Action Ne’er-do-well in and out of Nick

Another local far right eejit has been charged with terrorism activities for his involvement with neo-Nazi loons National Action.

On Wednesday 5 September, the BBC reported that he and a number of apparent comrades had been picked up in police “raids”:

Five people including a 17-year-old boy have been arrested on suspicion of being members of a banned far-right group.

Two men from Birmingham aged 22 and 28, a 23-year-old man and 22-year-old woman from Halifax and the teenager from Nottingham are being held by police in the West Midlands.

They are suspected of being members of National Action.

A number of properties are being searched following the arrests.

A separate report suggests the local lad was bailed while the others were remanded into custody.

On Monday it was reported that three of those arrested had been charged:

Garry Jack, 22, and Daniel Ward, 28, both from Birmingham, and a 17-year-old boy from Nottingham, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, were charged with being part of the group.

They are due to appear at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Tuesday.

National Action was founded in 2013. It made a reputation for itself with overblown rhetoric online, infamously celebrating the murder of Jo Cox MP. The group also made friends by displaying a banner insisting “Hitler was right”. (An odd position for a group whose politics seems closest to the Strasserites who Hitler tried to liquidate in the Night of the Long Knives.)

In December 2016, the group became the first British far-right group to be banned since the 1940s when it was made illegal under the Terrorism Act.

Since then there have been a string of raids and arrests picking up assorted members of the groups. Several have ended up serving prison sentences.

Locally the group has not had much obvious presence. Although they did claim to have (very briefly) turned up at Nottingham and Nottingham Trent Universities in 2015.

Whether the anonymous 17 year-old was an active member of just a loser following them online remains to be seen.