Tag Archives: law

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.


Teenager convicted for EDL graffiti in Leicestershire

A 17-year-old from Oadby in Leicestershire has pleaded guilty to two charges of racially-aggravated criminal damage for leaving graffiti outside a Oadby Central Mosque.

The teenager scrawled “EDL” on a charity bin outside the mosque and on the building’s windows on two separate occasions.

The graffiti appeared in the aftermath of the murder of Lee Rigby in London and at the hieght of fears about a racist backlash. In a statement read out in court, Muhammed Katib, chairman of the mosque, which is also a community centre, told how Muslims were in fear of being attacked.

According to the Leicester Mercury,

[Katib] said: “This really rang alarm bells.”

After the killing of Mr Rigby, mosques had been set on fire.

“We were on red alert and very concerned about what had happened,” said Mr Katib.

“We were fearful that the mosque would be damaged or set on fire or people would be attacked.”

Mr Katib told how the mosque was watched 24 hours a day for a while, and worshippers stayed away for fear of being targeted.

The teenager, who cannot be named because of his age (although we’ll keep an eye on teh interwebs in case he’s stupid enough to identify himself on Facebook) clearly isn’t very bright and was arrested after police identified his tag on the graffiti. When police raided his home, they found pens which matched the colour of the graffiti on the bin.

When arrested, the teenager said that he had heard about the Rigby murder and did not like it.

Now (unsurprisingly) he has expressed regret for his actions, saying “I am sorry if I caused any grief or fear or anything.”

He was given a 12-month rehabilitation order with supervision. He will be electronically tagged for two months and must observe a curfew between 9pm and 7am every day.