Far-right student who plotted a bomb attack on a police station jailed

Far-right student, 20, who plotted a bomb attack on a police station to spark a race war is jailed for four years

  •  Luke Skelton, 20, a far-right extremist, wrote the ‘Reactionary British Manifesto’

A student who planned a bomb attack on a police station to ignite a race war was jailed for four years today.

Luke Skelton, 20, a far-right extremist, wrote the ‘Reactionary British Manifesto’, which he planned to release after carrying out the attack, a court heard.

The teenager wrote down recipes for bomb-making and travelled to Newcastle City Centre to take surveillance pictures of a police station in September 2021.

The court heard he had researched how to make napalm and dynamite and written notes on his mobile phone about constructing a homemade bomb.

Skelton, of Washington, Tyne and Wear, had been referred to the Government’s Prevent programme after he used radical historical figures as his college profile picture. However, he dropped out of the de-radicalisation scheme when he turned 18.

Luke Skelton, 20, a far-right extremist, wrote the ‘Reactionary British Manifesto’, which he planned to release after carrying out the attack, a court heard

He was found guilty of preparing to carry out a terrorist attack following a trial at Teesside Crown Court.

Jurors were told the student had racist, sexist, homophobic, anti-Semitic and Islamophobic views.

Nick de la Poer KC, prosecuting, said Skelton went to Newcastle city centre ‘because he had a plan’ and that his plan was ‘to commit terrorist acts.’

He was said to believe in an extreme right-wing ideology which lionised Adolf Hitler and approved of the white supremacist attack on two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand.

His manifesto laid out his plans to roll Britain back to the 1900s, ‘beat back the invaders’ and to remove the vote from women.

His ‘policies’ were aimed at ‘rectifying the demographic imbalance’ in Britain of ‘native British men’ and were the ‘essential pre-requisite for the continuation and preservation of British culture,’ he said.

‘We desire a counter-cultural revolution enabling a return to the traditional ways and culture of the pre-war 20th century,’ Skelton wrote.

The teenager wrote down recipes for bomb-making and travelled to Newcastle City Centre to take surveillance pictures of a police station (pictured) in September 2021

Passing sentence, Judge Paul Watson KC, told Skelton: ‘Your fantasy was to turn back the pages of the history books to times when such xenophobic and hateful views are tolerated, even admired.

‘I am not, of course, sentencing you for the views you held, however repugnant they may be to those whose proud traditions are having fought against them in the past.

‘Your views about equality, the openness and inclusivity of liberal democracy and your apparent hatred of such things are views to which you are entitled, precisely because you live in such a society.

‘However, you went far beyond testing the boundaries of freedom of thought and expression and put in place plans to disrupt and undermine such democratic institutions.’

Rejecting his trial defence that the terror plot plans were ‘empty fantasies,’ the judge added: ‘You intended to put your plans into action.’

The court heard Skelton downloaded propaganda material on his phone from an extreme right-wing group. He was arrested by counter-terrorist police in June 2021 and told they were taking no further action, but in October he was arrested again and charged.

In one online message he wrote about becoming ‘the great man of history.’

He said he wanted to ‘accelerate the coming collapse and racial war’ adding: ‘Parliament will be responsible for the number of dead in the thousands.’

Crispin Aylett KC, defending, said Skelton’s responsibility was ‘substantially reduced’ by his autism, adding: ‘People with autism feel marginalised and are more prone to being radicalised. Some – and Luke Skelton was one of them – want to lash out.’

He also mentioned the ‘effects of Covid’ on young people as a factor.

Outside court Detective Chief Superintendent James Dunkerley, head of Counter-Terrorism Policing North East, said: ‘The defendant’s anger towards society, together with his extreme right-wing views, created a dangerous foundation from which his sinister plans were ultimately built.

‘He was strongly motivated by this mindset, which continued to fuel his actions and his later offending, despite repeated attempts to draw him away from it.’

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