Andrew Dymock: Neo-Nazi guilty of terrorism charges

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Andrew DymockImage source, PA Media
Image caption,

Andrew Dymock has also been found guilty of three hate crimes

A politics student who called for the "extermination" of Jewish people has been found guilty of 12 terrorism charges.

Andrew Dymock, from Bath, established the banned right-wing groups System Resistance Network (SRN) and Sonnenkrieg Division.

He also published an article stating that Jewish people were a "cancer".

The 24-year-old was convicted at the Old Bailey and is due to be sentenced on 24 June.

Image source, Counter Terrorism Policing North East
Image caption,

Images taken from SRN videos were shown to jurors

From his parents' house in Bath and his student bedroom in Aberystwyth he established two now proscribed groups.

Dymock believed in what is known as the "Siege" ideology which advocates rape as a political weapon.

The groups claimed they were committed to using violence to end democracy and drive non-white people out of Britain.

The son of two academics, Stella and Dr David Dymock, a professor of dentistry at Bristol University, Andrew Dymock was first exposed by a BBC investigation in 2018.

As the verdicts were delivered, he told jurors "thank you for killing me".

In total he was convicted of 15 offences:

  • Five counts of encouraging terrorism

  • Four of disseminating terrorist publications

  • Two of terrorist fundraising

  • One of possessing material useful to a terrorist

  • One of possessing racially inflammatory material

  • One of stirring up racial hatred

  • One of stirring up hatred on the grounds of sexual orientation

Det Ch Supt Martin Snowden, head of counter terrorism policing north east, said as he had established two terrorist organisations, Dymock was a "key leader" and his conviction was a "key step in protecting the UK".

The trial heard he used the SRN website to publish an article stating Jewish people should be exterminated.

He stated a "racial holy war is inevitable" and "every stabbing, bombing, shooting further plays into our hands".

Dymock had also engaged in terrorist fundraising by seeking and receiving financial donations via the SRN website using a dedicated Paypal account he created.

He used the SRN Twitter account to share extremist texts and called for "total war".

Dymock denied responsibility for the accounts, claiming he was set up by his now former partner, who had failed to recruit him to join banned terrorist group National Action (NA).

Image source, PA Media
Image caption,

As the verdicts were delivered, he told jurors "thank you for killing me"

Prosecutor Jocelyn Ledward earlier told jurors he was not being prosecuted for holding racist, anti-Semitic or homophobic beliefs, or for his "adherence to a neo-Nazi creed".

She said: "Rather, he is facing prosecution for his encouragement of terrorist activity, of violence, as a means to shape society in accordance with his beliefs, rather than through free speech and democracy."

An examination of Dymock's computer revealed longstanding extremist views dating back to when he was 17, including a Google translation of the words "Kill all of the Jews".

On 8 October, 2017, he wrote about the creation of SRN on a right-wing webpage stating the group was "focused on building a group of loyal men, true to the cause of national socialism and establishing the fascist state through revolution".

Image source, Counter Terrorism Policing North East
Image caption,

Dymock admitted being in images provided to the court by Counter Terrorism Policing North

Jurors heard how he was expelled from SRN in late February 2018.

Dymock was arrested the morning after a BBC News investigation in December 2018 exposed his extremist activities.

Police found extreme right-wing literature in his luggage along with clothing bearing neo-Nazi logos.

He also had books, flags, clothes and badges with links to the extreme right wing in his bedroom at home and university.

Dymock claimed he was "set up" by others, and that material linking him to content on the SRN website and Twitter account was "planted in his possession without his knowledge".

At trial he denied being a neo-Nazi and told police: "In fact, I am bisexual but lean towards being homosexual, in direct conflict with Nazism."

He claimed he was instead the victim of a conspiracy.

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