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Jack Andrew Renshaw (born 1995) is a convicted child sex offender and former spokesperson for the neo-Nazi organization National Action. He is a former economics and politics student at Manchester Metropolitan University and a former organiser for the British National Party (BNP) youth wing, BNP Youth. On 12 June 2018, Renshaw pleaded guilty to preparing an act of terrorism with the intention of killing the Labour MP Rosie Cooper and to making a threat to kill a police officer.[1]
He is affiliated with the Alt-Right.
Biography edit
Renshaw was born in Ormskirk and raised in Skelmersdale. As a child, Renshaw moved to Blackpool and later became involved with the English Defense League (EDL), aged 15. Through the EDL, he became "involved with the 'Justice for Charlene Downes' cause", and met British National Party (BNP) members and their leader Nick Griffin at one of the memorials. Renshaw had previously been disillusioned with the EDL after he found Israeli and gay pride flags on prominent display during their marches, and lamented that the British activist Tommy Robinson was supporting "dark faces" being within the crowd. Renshaw joined the BNP at age 15 against his parents' wishes.[1]
While an economic and politics student at the Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU) in September 2013, Renshaw became the face of BNP Youth. In an interview with student newspaper The Tab, he claimed to have "had ethnic minority flatmates and some homosexuals" during his stay at university. Four years after joining BNP Youth, Renshaw decided to dedicate himself entirely to party campaigning, saying "I spend [sic] a lot of days canvassing when I should have been studying". He was eventually forced to leave MMU in September 2015 following a university investigation regarding his incitement to racial hatred.[1]
Renshaw wishes to bring back National Service and has previously said that he wished to join the British Army when he left university. He has an uncompromising attitude towards the War on Drugs, saying that "drug dealers should be hung [sic] from the nearest lamppost ... [lethal injection execution] would cost too much money for the taxpayer". Renshaw's application for the BNP to gain Student Union recognition was rejected by the union; Renshaw and the BNP Youth organised in protest at this decision. He views the British Royal Family as "Jewish vermin", "in the pockets of the Rothschilds" and believes that "the lot of them should hang".
During a Yorkshire Forum event in 2015, Renshaw called for Jews to be "eradicated".[2] As the spokesman for National Action, a far-right organisation within the United Kingdom, Renshaw said that he was sympathetic to Adolf Hitler:
| “ | Hitler was right in many senses but you know where he was wrong? He showed mercy to people who did not deserve mercy ... As nationalists we need to learn from the mistakes of the national socialists and we need to realise that, no, you do not show the Jew mercy. | „ |
Renshaw faced a criminal investigation by the West Yorkshire Police over the remarks.
In March 2016, the Liverpool Echo reported that Renshaw was thought to have been part of a group of neo-Nazi North West Infidels and National Action protestors in a rally in Liverpool. Using the Twitter name Jack Albion, he posted "[Shit], bricks, glass bottles etcetera - still we come back. We don't fight for ourselves but for an idea. #WR #Liverpool #NationalAction".
Additionally, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) was considering whether to charge Renshaw with inciting racial hatred over comments made at a public demonstration in Blackpool in March 2016, organised by the North West Infidels. In front of police officers and surrounded by a group of masked men, Renshaw described Jews as "parasites", claimed that white people were "a superior race" and stated that the UK took the "wrong side" in the World War II by fighting the Nazis "who were there to remove Jewry from Europe once and for all". "When the time comes," he said, antifascists will "be in the chambers ... and we'll execute them".[2]
Dave Rich, of the Community Security Trust, which represents the Jewish community on matters of anti-semitism, said, "Anybody who is inciting hatred and violence of that kind needs to be dealt with fully by the law. Actions don't come from nowhere." Nick Lowles of Hope Not Hate criticised perceived double standards in the justice system, saying that were such words to be uttered by an Islamist extremist, they would have been arrested. The CPS at that point had taken no action over Renshaw's comments.
National Action was proscribed as a terrorist organisation following its conduct after the murder of Jo Cox and its support for her murderer Thomas Mair.
In November 2016, Renshaw was facing criminal charges over incitement to racial hatred.[3]
In July 2017, he was charged by the CPS, under pressure from the Campaign Against Antisemitism.
In early 2018 Renshaw was convicted of two counts of stirring up racial hatred.[3]
On June 12, 2018, Renshaw and five others appeared in court, charged with planning to kill a police officer who had investigated him for his child sex offences[4], along with Member of Parliament Rosie Cooper. He pleaded guilty. In 2019 he was convicted and sentenced to life in prison with a minimum of twenty years.[5]
References edit
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 The story of Jack Renshaw: The ex-Manchester student and paedophile who plotted a murder, The Tab
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Hitler’s only fault showing mercy to Jews, youth leader told secret meeting, The Times
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Skelmersdale man who plotted to kill MP also "stirred up racial hatred" in public speeches, Wigan Today
- ↑ Neo-Nazi, 23, who plotted to kill a Labour MP with a machete is unmasked as a convicted paedophile who groomed boys as young as 13 after jury fails to reach a verdict in his National Action trial, The Daily Mail
- ↑ Neo-Nazi who planned to murder Labour MP jailed for life, The Guardian