Neo-Nazi suspect admits machete plot to kill MP in name of ‘White Jihad’
A SUSPECTED member of a banned neo-Nazi group plotted to murder a Labour MP and a policewoman in the name of ‘ White Jihad’, a court heard yesterday.
Jack Renshaw, 23, is said to have planned to slash Rosie Cooper and Detective Constable Victoria Henderson with a 19-inch machete.
Jurors were told how the suspected ringleader of the far-Right group, Christopher Lythgoe, 32, had earlier suggested murdering then-Home Secretary Amber Rudd.
But after she was deemed to be ‘too well protected’, he was said to have given his ‘blessing’ for the terrorist attack and told Renshaw: ‘Don’t f*** it up.’
The plan was only thwarted when a disenchanted member of the far-Right cell reported it to the police, jurors were told.
On the opening day of his trial at the Old Bailey, Renshaw, from Skelmersdale, Lancashire, pleaded guilty to preparing acts of terrorism. But he denied being a member of the banned group National Action along
‘Virulently racist and homophobic’
with Lythgoe and four others – Garron Helm, 24, Matthew Hankinson, 24, Andrew Clarke, 33, and Michael Trubini, 25.
National Action became the first Rightwing group to be proscribed in Britain since the Second World War after it voiced support for the murder of Labour MP Jo Cox in 2016.
Since its formation in 2013, it had engaged in a campaign to stir up a race war using ‘virulently racist, anti-Semitic, and homophobic propaganda’, jurors were told.
It was during a meeting at a pub in Warrington, Cheshire, last July that Renshaw unveiled his plot, the court heard.
Jurors were told how he had bought a ‘ Gladius machete’ for £54.10, which offered ‘19 inches of unprecedented piercing and slashing power at a bargain price’.
The former spokesman for National Action was also said to have searched the web for advice on how to cut the jugular artery and how long it would take to die from such a wound.
The court heard he intended to kill Mrs Cooper, 67, because she was of the same party as Jo Cox and therefore ‘perceived’ to have the same support for immigration. But the threat of violence was also personal, Duncan Atkinson QC, prosecuting, said.
Renshaw is alleged to have planned to lure DC Henderson – his ‘real target’ – to the scene of his first attack in order to kill her as revenge for questioning him twice in January last year. The first time was over two anti- Semitic speeches in which he claimed ‘Hitler was right’ and the second time over what police believed to be evidence of child sex offences found on his phone.
Renshaw believed DC Henderson was trying to destroy his life and make him sound like a paedophile, the Old Bailey heard.
Mr Atkinson said: ‘Renshaw’s plan had a more sophisticated dimension in that its objective was not simply to make a political point, as he put it to kill for National Action and White Jihad, but to revenge himself on those he considered to be persecuting him and trying to send him to prison for a significant period.’
When Renshaw first sought permission of Lythgoe to carry out the attack, he was allegedly told the MP was ‘a nobody’ and to attack Amber Rudd instead due to her high profile role as Home Secretary.
Renshaw was said to have dismissed the idea, believing Miss Rudd to be ‘too well protected’.
Mr Atkinson said Lythgoe later gave him permission at the pub meeting, telling him: ‘Don’t f*** it up’. The murderous scheme was only foiled by disenchanted former National Action member Robbie Mullen, who reported it to campaign group Hope Not Hate, the jury heard.
Mr Atkinson said: ‘It is important to recognise from the outset that these defendants are not being prosecuted for their racist or neo-Nazi beliefs, however repulsive they may be, but for their participation in a banned organisation that sought actively through fear, intimidation and the threat of violence rather than through free speech and democracy to shape society.’
The trial continues.