A judge has decided against sending a 14-year-old boy—thought to be one of the youngest people in Britain to become a convicted terrorist—to prison, saying he was not “dangerous” in the legal sense.
The court heard he expressed racist and far-right opinions online, and hinted about carrying out a school shooting, as well as writing several suicide notes.
The boy, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, admitted three counts of possessing a terrorist publication, at a hearing at Westminster Magistrates’ Court earlier this year.
On Friday the defendant appeared for sentencing before Britain’s Chief Magistrate, Senior District Judge Paul Goldspring, at Newton Aycliffe Youth Court in County Durham.
The boy, who lives in Darlington, told the judge he had an “obsession with the military” from a young age but said: “I turned into something that was not good.”
The boy, who was accompanied by his mother, promised Goldspring he would not reoffend and said the talk of a school attack was just a “fantasy.”
Prosecutor Jane Stansfield, prosecuting, said the boy was 11 when he downloaded an image of Hitler and she said an image was found of him making a Nazi salute.
He was just 13 when he downloaded the Anarchist’s Cookbook, a manual about making plastic explosives and a document about bomb designs in the Middle East.
At one point, after he talked on social media about blowing up an orphanage, counter-terrorist police officers were tipped off and his home was searched.
Detectives seized his computer, hard drive, and mobile phone and found evidence of his interest in racist ideology, Nazism, and the Columbine massacre.
The boy’s lawyer, Stephen Andrews, said: “You have before the courts a very complex young man showing signs of both extreme naivety and vulnerability at the same time as elements of sophistication in access to information one would not ordinarily associate with someone of his age.”
Imposing a 12-month referral order, Goldspring said the boy had traits of autism and suffered trauma in the past but he told him: “Just about every minority receives your vitriol and the terminology you used was concerning and abhorrent in equal measure.”
Detective Superintendent Matt Davison from Counter Terrorism Policing North East urged the public to report any concerns they had about extremist views being expressed in person or on social media.
