UK: British nationalist arrested on terrorism (and pornography) charges

A right-wing extremist who wanted to "secure a future for white children" and kept explosives at his Yorkshire flat was convicted on terrorism charges on Tuesday.


Martyn Gilleard, 31, from Goole in East Yorkshire, was found guilty at Leeds Crown Court of the preparation of terrorist acts and of collecting information useful for an act of terrorism.


He had pleaded guilty at earlier hearings to possessing live ammunition and 39,000 indecent images of children.


Police conducting a child pornography raid last October had discovered racist literature, home-made bombs, knives and a rifle at Gilleard's flat.


Among the material seized were membership cards for the National Front, British People's Party and the White Nationalist Party.


In a handwritten speech also found, Gilleard wrote of "our duty as white British nationalists to reclaim our nation."


"I am so sick and tired of hearing nationalists talk of killing Muslims, of blowing up mosques, of fighting back, only to see these acts of resistance fail to appear," he had written.


"The time has come to stop the talk and start to act."


On a separate scrap of paper illustrated with a Nazi flag he had written: "We must secure the existence of our race and a future for white children, for race and nation."


Gilleard, who has a young child by a former girlfriend, worked as a fork-lift driver at a timber yard.


Officers who visited the yard before arresting him last November found Gilleard's high-visibility jacket marked with a hand-drawn swastika.


Police said Gilleard was an extremely dangerous individual.


"Not only has he openly expressed extreme far-right views and a desire to act on them, he also had the capability to do so," said Detective Chief Superintendent John Parkinson, head of the Leeds Counter Terrorism Unit.


"Gilleard had access to weapons and more frighteningly, explosives. He had even gone as far as to create small, hand-held bombs.


"We can only assume that his intention was to use them and we are thankful we were able to intervene before he had an opportunity to do so."


He will be sentenced later this week.


Source: Reuters (English), h/t Islam & The West

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