Neo-Nazi organised boxing sessions in Swindon, court told

Mark Jones, 25, is this week being sentenced for his role in the extreme right-wing group, which was banned by the government in 2016 after a series of rallies and incidents including praising the murder of MP Jo Cox.

Appearing alongside him in the dock at Birmingham Crown Court is his former partner Alice Cutter, a Miss Hitler beauty pageant contestant, Garry Jack and Connor Scothern. They were convicted of membership of a terrorist group, after a trial in March.

Mark Jones and another group member pose with a National Action flag at a Nazi death camp Picture: West Midlands Police/PA

Jones, a former member of the British National Party’s youth wing, was described as a leader and strategist who played a prominent and active role in the group.

Prosecutor Barnaby Jameson told the court Jones had organised members’ physical training including boxing sessions in Swindon. The location of the boxing sessions was not revealed.

The young man, who was originally the group’s London organiser, posed for a photograph while delivering a Nazi-style salute and holding a National Action flag in the execution room at the Buchenwald death camp in Germany.

After National Action was banned by the government in 2016 he joined splinter groups Scottish Dawn and NS131, both of which were later banned.

He appeared in an NS131 promotional video daubing the logo on a wall in Swindon.

How the Adver covered the secret meeting in 2016

In 2016, the group held a “joint social” in the town with members from London and south west England. Racist graffiti was sprayed on a wall along the Moorings, behind Westcott Place Garage. A swastika and a depiction of Adolf Hitler next to the word “hero” were among the paintings.

Two years later, neo-Nazi graffiti advertising the NS131 group was also found on the Locarno building in Old Town.

Lovers

At a trial in March, the Birmingham jury heard how Jones and 23-year-old Cutter were lovers. Jones, the London regional organiser for National Action, picked his successor to cover the capital before he moved to Sowerby Bridge, West Yorkshire, in order to be with Cutter.

The pair exchanged hundreds of messages full of antisemitic remarks and racist epithets. Cutter, a waitress, had a picture of Holocaust victim Anne Frank on her phone with the caption: “What’s that smell – oh it’s my family burning.” They joked about using lethal chlorine gas on Jews and both posed for photographs next to a Nazi-saluting snowman.

Alice Cutter Picture: PA

Cutter also entered the group’s Miss Hitler competition, under the name Miss Buchenwald, referencing the Nazi-era death camp where thousands of Jews went to their deaths.

Jones, a railway engineer, ordered several knives on the internet and posed with the blades for photos, some of which were taken by Cutter. Both claimed they were for the couple’s camping trips.

Mark Jones poses with an AK-47 assault rifle Picture: West Midlands Police/PA

On the day of the National Action group’s ban, Cutter messaged Jones fearing what their future may hold.

In a message on December 12, 2016, she told him: “You’re the most important person to me right now.”

Foot-soldiers

Jack, 24, of Heathland Avenue, Birmingham, was described as an active and committed member of National Action, attending almost every one of the group’s Midlands meetings.

He had previously been given a suspended jail term for plastering Birmingham’s Aston University campus with National Action stickers in July 2016, some of which read “Britain is ours, the rest must go”.

Scothern, 19, of Bagnall Avenue, Nottingham, was one of the most active members of the group and considered future leadership material, the court heard.

Another leading member once observed how Scothern had driven himself into poverty travelling to member meetings and self-funding 1,500 stickers, calling for a “Final Solution” – in reference to the Nazi’s genocide of Jews.

The four defendants are expected to be sentenced on Tuesday.