Former Tesco worker jailed for plotting terrorist attack after building neo-Nazi hit list
Former Tesco worker Alfie Coleman, now 22, was just 14 when he first began to trawl the internet for extreme right-wing material on is electronic devices.
During a retrial at the Old Bailey, prosecutors said Coleman downloaded a neo-Nazio text on his iPad as a young teenager.
He also penned a "manifesto" in a diary and identified potential targets, including the Lord Mayor of London and a mosque, the court heard.
Judge Richard Marks KC said on Wednesday that Coleman must be treated as a dangerous offender, describing the views the defendant expressed as “virulently racist".
The judge sentenced him to 13-and-a-half years in prison after he was found guilty of preparing for terrorist acts.
He told Coleman: "[Giving evidence] You maintained that much of what you had said and the virulently racist views which you expressed were no more than intrusive thoughts and did not represent what you believed in real life.
"It was in effect, although you did not use these words, hyperbole, bravado, fantasy, and you never had any intention to carry out an attack."
The 22-year-old appeared tearful and wiped his eyes with a tissue as the judge made his remarks.
Coleman, a former Tesco part-time employee, went on to compile a hate list of colleagues and customers he branded with racial slurs or as "race traitors".
The trial heard he penned the manifesto in a diary and identified potential targets, including the Lord Mayor of London and a mosque.
He was caught after undercover officers from MI5 engaged with Coleman in an encrypted chat as he sought to buy weapons.
Authorities first became concerned in the summer of 2023 when Coleman, from Great Notley in Essex, became increasingly active on online extreme right-wing groups.
The then-19-year-old arranged with an undercover officer to buy a Makarov pistol, five magazines and 200 rounds of ammunition, in a Morrisons car park in Stratford, east London, in September 2023.
Jurors saw dramatic video of Coleman dropping £3,500 in a Land Rover Discovery and picking up a holdall containing the handgun and ammunition from the boot.
Before he had gone 30 yards, Coleman, who was carrying his Tesco employee card, was confronted by armed counter-terrorism police and forced to the ground.
A search of the home he shared with his parents and sibling revealed the extent of Coleman’s murderous ideology, including idolising Thomas Mair, the extremist who killed MP Jo Cox.
Police found £2,500 in savings and a device to detect bugs and secret cameras in his bedside drawer, a rock with a Swastika on a table, a Black Sun flag associated with neo-Nazism on the wall, and various extreme right-wing books
.Giving evidence, Coleman described being lonely and suffering with his mental health during the Covid-19 lockdowns.
Coleman had admitted attempting to possess both a firearm and ammunition but denied he was preparing for a terrorist attack.
He had also pleaded guilty to possessing 10 documents with information likely to be useful to terrorists such as texts on weaponry and bomb-making instructions.
Issuing a warning to other parents, the Met’s Commander Helen Flanagan, Head of Counter Terrorism Policing London said afterwards: "What is particularly concerning is that Coleman was radicalised online from when he was just 14 years’ old, and sadly we’re seeing more and more examples of young people and children being drawn into violent extremism and terrorism this way.
"This is why I’m urging parents and carers to make sure that you are aware of what your children are doing online. While it may be difficult, it is vital that you have conversations with them, and if you are still concerned, then ACT Early and get in touch, so that they can be steered down a different path before it is too late."
Technology & Business Editor
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