A 16-year-old who wrote about “gassing” Jewish people has become the youngest person ever convicted of terrorism charges in the United Kingdom.
The teenager, from Cornwall, was sentenced on Monday to two years in a youth rehabilitation center after pleading guilty last week to 10 counts of possessing terrorist material and two counts of disseminating terrorist documents, according to the Times of Israel.
Prosecutors said the teenager, who has not been publicly identified due to his age, first received instructions on how to make and fight with weapons at the age of 13, including Molotov cocktails and an AK-47. He began collecting materials and engaging in neo-Nazi chatrooms a year later.
In addition to expressing a desire to kill Jews, he also wrote about hanging gay people and “shoot[ing] up their parades.”
It was said in court that in 2019, the teenager became the leader of a British cell of Feuerkrieg Division, a European group tied to the better-known neo-Nazi group Atomwaffen Division, which is based in the United States and tied to at least five alleged murders.
The defendant was accused of recruiting five other members into his cell, which called for a “white jihad.” Among those recruited was a 13-year-old from Estonia, who police said in April of last year used the online pseudonym “Commander” to communicate with the other members of the group.
Jenny Hopkins, a prosecutor in the British teenager’s case, told the court that while the teenager claimed not to be racist and said he got involved in the group “to appear cool,” the “body of evidence led to him pleading guilty to possession and dissemination of terrorist material,” according to the BBC.
The judge in the case said that the teenager had entered an “online world of wicked prejudice and violent bigotry” but also noted that he had “significant vulnerabilities” because of an “abnormal childhood.”
