National Action: Neo-Nazi terror group co-founded by Swindon man 'dismantled'

It follows the convictions of 19 men who were members of the banned National Action, including the organisation's co-founder - 32-year-old Swindon man Ben Raymond. 

Raymond co-founded the neo-Nazi group together with Swansea's Alex Davies, 27, who became the latest person to be convicted on May 17 at Winchester Crown Court for attempting to build a "white supremacist homeland within the UK".

Together, Davies and Raymond had worked since the group’s creation in 2013 in spreading an “ideology of hatred”, described as “incredibly dangerous” by counter-terrorism police.

Ben Raymond appearing in court

Ben Raymond leaves court. Picture: PA

“The risk National Action presented was clear,” said Superintendent Anthony Tagg, head of the West Midlands’ counter terrorism unit, which led the investigation to break up National Action and Davies’ successor “continuity” group, NS131.

The organisation was outlawed by then-home secretary Amber Rudd at the end of 2016, who branded it “racist, antisemitic and homophobic”.

It became the first right-wing organisation to be banned since the Second World War.

The Government acted after members of the organisation celebrated the actions of murderer and neo-Nazi Thomas Mair, who killed MP Jo Cox in June 2016.

Among those convicted of membership since December 2016 have been British soldier and Afghanistan veteran, Finnish-born Mikko Vehvilainen, and former Met probationary police officer Ben Hannam.

One of the group’s associates was convicted of making a working pipe bomb, while another, Jack Renshaw, of Skelmersdale, Lancashire, later admitted plotting to kill MP Rosie Cooper with a machete.

He was jailed for life with a minimum of 20 years.

Renshaw’s gambit was only foiled after a National Action member bravely turned on his former friends, reporting the plan to counter-extremist group, Hope Not Hate, who passed the information to police.

Speaking after Davies’ trial, Mr Tagg said: “The risk National Action presented was clear.

“They, through their recruitment, sought to identify individuals in what they considered to be positions of authority; within the British Army, within policing.

“They sought to utilise those positions to further their ideological cause.

“They, through the work they’d done, gathered together weapons, had gathered together material that talked about the creation of explosive devices, and one of them had created a pipe bomb and was prosecuted successfully for that.

“National Action were incredibly dangerous, and the ideology they espoused was an ideology of hatred, which caused division in communities across the country.”