Jack Renshaw: Neo-Nazi paedophile who plotted to kill Labour MP jailed for life
Would-be terrorist performed Hitler salute in court as he was led down to cells
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A neo-Nazi paedophile who plotted to murder a Labour MP has been jailed for life, giving a Hitler salute as he was sent down.
Jack Renshaw, 23, was a member of the terrorist group National Action before he planned to kill Rosie Cooper with a machete.
He told fellow extremists of his plan to take hostages in a pub afterwards and lure a police officer who investigated him for child sex offences there, and kill her too.
Renshaw, of Skelmersdale in Lancashire, was handed a life sentence with a minimum term of 20 years at the Old Bailey on Friday.
He raised his arm in an apparent Nazi salute as a supporter in the public gallery shouted “we’re with you Jack” as he was led to the cells.
Justice McGowan said: “Your perverted view of history and current politics has caused you to believe it right to demonise groups simply because they are different from you.”
The judge praised the “dignity and bravery” shown by Ms Cooper and a police officer Renshaw targeted, adding: “They show the true public spirit and public interest that motivated their work. You have not defeated them.”
Ms Cooper, the Labour MP for West Lancashire, said “justice had been served”.
“Not for me personally, but for every MP and public servant, and for our democratic way of life which affords us the privilege of free speech, without fear of violent retribution,” she added.
“My deepest wish is that this case is the last occasion when any public servant, any politician, has their life threatened for simply doing their job.”
Renshaw revealed his plot at a Warrington pub in July 2017, little over a year after Labour MP Jo Cox was murdered by another white supremacist.
Police were alerted after Robbie Mullen, who had also been a member of National Action, warned counter-extremism charity Hope Not Hate of the plot.
Ms Cooper said his bravery “saved my life”, adding: “Thanks also to my family, friends and constituents for all their kindness, hard work and support over the last two years.”
Mr Mullen, who has faced death threats, warned that there are “many more Jack Renshaws out there”.
“The last two years have been horrendous, stressful and very, very hard but I wouldn’t change a single thing I did,” he added.
“When I realised that National Action needed to be stopped, I knew that I couldn’t just walk away from it.”
Renshaw had already bought a 19-inch-long machete, which investigators found stashed in an airing cupboard, and had researched his targets’ movements.
He conducted online research on cutting the jugular artery and how long it would take someone to die from the wound.
The machete was of a type used by Roman soldiers, and prosecutors said Renshaw believed the “Jewish-controlled state” was oppressing the white community, seeing Ms Cooper as a “race traitor” who deserved to die.
Renshaw was first arrested in January 2017 over speeches where he called for the genocide of Jewish people. He was later jailed for three years for stirring up racial hatred.
Police who seized his phone as part of that investigation discovered evidence that he had groomed underage boys online.
A court heard that he set up two fake Facebook profiles and contacted the boys, aged 13 and 14, between February 2016 and January 2017.
The former British National Party youth wing leader boasted to the youngsters that he was rich, could give them jobs and offered one of them £300 to spend the night with him.
He also requested intimate photographs of the pair before one of the boys reported the messages to his tutor and the police were contacted.
Phones belonging to Renshaw showed evidence of searches for homosexual pornography, but he told police he was a straight virgin who did not believe in sex outside of marriage, and viewed homosexuality as “unnatural”.
He was convicted of four counts of inciting a child to engage in sexual activity, given a 16-month jail term and placed on the sex offenders’ register for 10 years.
Renshaw’s terror trial heard that he accused the police officer who first interviewed him, DC Victoria Henderson, of “fabricating” the grooming evidence and developed “resentment against the police”.
In July 2017, he told fellow neo-Nazis of a plan to murder Ms Cooper with a machete, take hostages in a pub and lure DC Henderson there to kill her too.
Renshaw said he would then would commit “suicide by cop” by pretending to have a suicide vest on, and leave a video behind claiming the attack had been carried out on behalf of National Action.
Jenny Hopkins, of the Crown Prosecution Service, said: “A crime of this type against anyone is a serious matter but when our MPs are targeted it is also an attack on the democratic process and public service.”
Earlier this year, a jury failed to reach a verdict over whether Renshaw, of Skelmersdale in Lancashire, and two other defendants were members of National Action at the time.
Renshaw denied membership of a proscribed group alongside Andrew Clarke, 34, and Michal Trubini, 36, from Warrington, who walked free earlier this year.
Former National Action leader Christopher Lythgoe, 32, of Warrington, and his right-hand man Matthew Hankinson, 24, from Merseyside, were convicted of membership at a previous trial.
Detective Superintendent Will Chatterton, the head of investigations for Counter Terrorism Policing North West, said the case had dismantled a “significant arm” of the group in northwest England.
But The Independent has revealed that factions of the terrorist group continue to operate under different names, and the officer admitted that it would be “naive” to think the group has disappeared.
Nick Lowles, Hope not Hate’s chief executive, accused authorities of “taking their eye off National Action” after the group was banned in 2016.
“Former National Action members are still active, successor organisations are being formed, and a threat still clearly remains,” he added.
Det Supt Chatterton said “there may well be people out there who still hold those views and still commit acts of criminality or terrorism”.
“We are alive to the fact that unfortunately extreme right-wing sentiment is on the rise and we take that extremely seriously,” he told The Independent.
“This sentencing should send out a strong message, firstly that we will investigate any terrorism from right across the spectrum, whether that’s left wing, right wing or international.
“Anyone who holds such a mindset and espouses such repulsive views should be looking over their shoulder, because we will root them out.