Alfie Coleman, a 22-year-old neo-Nazi from Great Notley, Essex, was sentenced to 13 and a half years in prison on Wednesday at the Old Bailey for preparing terrorist acts, including a plot to attack the Lord Mayor of London and a mosque. He was caught after an undercover MI5 operation in which he attempted to buy a Makarov pistol, five magazines, and 200 rounds of ammunition.
Undercover Sting and Arrest
Coleman arranged to meet an undercover officer in a Morrisons car park in Stratford, east London, on September 29, 2023. He handed over £3,500 in a Land Rover Discovery and picked up a holdall containing the handgun and ammunition from the boot. Before he had gone 30 yards, armed counter-terrorism police confronted him and forced him to the ground. He was carrying his Tesco employee card at the time.
Extreme Right-Wing Ideology
Judge Richard Marks KC described Coleman as a “dangerous offender” with “virulently racist” views. The court heard that Coleman began accessing extreme right-wing material at age 14, including a neo-Nazi text he downloaded on his iPad. He wrote a “manifesto” in a diary, identifying targets such as the Lord Mayor of London and a mosque. He also compiled a hate list of colleagues and customers at Tesco, branding them with racial slurs or as “race traitors.”
Evidence of Planning
Police found a collection of knives, a small stone axe, an air rifle, a device to detect bugs and secret cameras, a rock with a Swastika, and a Black Sun flag associated with neo-Nazism in his home. His electronic devices revealed plans for potential attacks, including hijacking a plane and targeting the Lord Mayor’s home with explosives in a cash machine, as well as using knives and crossbows.
Radicalisation and Mental Health
Coleman’s trial heard he idolised Thomas Mair, the extremist who killed MP Jo Cox. He emailed the far-right white supremacist organisation Patriotic Alternative in July 2021, expressing a desire to participate in activism. Mitigating, Martin Rutherford KC said Coleman was “intelligent, articulate and polite” but his “obsessive personality took a horribly wrong turn back in 2020.” The court heard Coleman has traits of autism spectrum disorder and struggled with loneliness and mental health during Covid-19 lockdowns.
Sentencing and Public Safety
Judge Marks spared Coleman a life sentence, citing his age, immaturity, autistic spectrum disorder traits, anxiety, vulnerability, lack of previous convictions, and the absence of actual physical harm. The judge ordered a forfeiture of items and a notification order requiring Coleman to share personal information with the police for 30 years. Commander Helen Flanagan of Counter Terrorism Policing London said: “It is extremely concerning that such a young person was planning to murder innocent members of the public as part of an extreme right-wing terrorist plot. But thankfully Counter Terrorism Policing, working with our colleagues in MI5, were able to intervene and arrest him before he was able to harm anyone.”
