Two men have each been sentenced to 10 years in prison after being found guilty of deliberately setting fire to a Stoke-on-Trent mosque.
Ex-soldier Simon Beech, 23, and Garreth Foster, 29, both from Stoke, were found guilty of setting fire to Hanley's Regent Road mosque on 3 December.
The pair had denied committing arson with intent to endanger life.
Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court heard it was in revenge for Muslim extremists burning poppies on Armistice Day.
Beech told the court during the four-day trial that he had been a member of the English Defence League and the British National Party. But he said he was not racist and did not believe his views to be extreme.
'Nuke all mosques'
Paul Spratt, prosecuting, told the jury of five men and seven women that police had been able to establish that Beech "felt very strongly about Muslims" after accessing his Facebook account.
"He found persons through Facebook who had like-minded views. One observation he plainly agreed with was 'Nuke All Mosques'."
The jury heard that one of Beech's online comments read: "The time has come. They burn our poppies, we burn their place. Burn the lot of them out."
The blaze caused about £50,000 damage to the Mosque.
BBC News
Scum deserve it. Justice well and truly served !!
ReplyDelete"Beech told the court during the four-day trial that he had been a member of the English Defence League and the British National Party. But he said he was not racist and did not believe his views to be extreme".
ReplyDeleteAs did members of the SS in denial of their crimes against humanity!!!
How soon are these Nazi scum listed as "political prisoners" by thier Nasty supporters for committing like Emma West allegedly, a CRIMINAL office?
ReplyDeleteAbsolute scum these EDL neo-Nazis are.
ReplyDeleteTo hell with the white supremacist bastards!
The longer it goes on like this and the EDL are not proscribed as the terrorist organisation they now clearly are, the more clear it becomes they are state-controlled.
ReplyDelete