Victims of the Soho Bombing

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Visit betteretterhLp. com slash random podcast for ten percent off your first month of online therapy Podcast powers the world's best podcasts Here's a show that we recommend Hello American podcast listeners., Max Ruston here from the Guardian Football Weekly which I think you should give a listen. It is good. It comes out three times a week and the podcast delivers you analysis, news, both the good and the bad from the beautiful game, and maybe even the occasional laugh. He's angry about everything. He doesn't have a great poker face, doest? I would like to play cards with Runo Fernando. You can listen to the Guardian Football Weekly wherever you get your podcasts, Hopefully see you soon ACast helps creators launch, grow and monetize their podcasts everywhere. ACast. com. Busy Saturday afternoon in april nineteen ninety nine. Pppers filled the streets of Briickon, weaving through market stalls and storefronts when a black sports bag was noticed, left unattended on the pavement. At first, it barely raised concern People joked about it Some even picked it up, moving it from place to place, trying to figure out who it belonged to But inside that bag was a nail bomb ticking down in the middle of a crowded community And within minutes, curiosity would turn into catastrophe This wasn't an isolated incident. It was the opening move in a three week campaign of terror that would see three different London communities targeted and a single attacker driven by hatred, intent on causing as much devastation as possible But on that day in Brixton No one knew what was coming. or just how close they were to stopping it In this episode of British Murders withith Stuart Blues, we're heading to England's capital city to explore the april nineteen ninety nine London nail bombings is a case defined by split second decisions, near misses, and unimaginable consequences Be sometimes the difference between life and death comes down to moments you don't even realize matter Before we get into today's case, I've got a quick favor to ask. If you're listening to this on a podcast app, please follow the show or subscribe on YouTube if that's where you're watching. It doesn't cost a thing, but it really helps British murders reach more people who care about these stories. Ratings and reviews make a huge difference too, so thank you if you've already left one. And if you'd like add free episodes, early access and a load of exclusive content you want here on the main feed, you can find all of that over at patreon. com forward slash British Murders. The story I'm about to share with you requires a lot of context setting Because the actions of the perpetrator, in his mind, were directly linked to a period of significant social and political tension within the UK We're heading back to the spring of nineteen ninety nine this week, and it was in that early part of the year, february twenty fourth to be exact, that the McPherson report, formerly known as the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry, was published It was the result of the public inquiry into the metetropolitan pololice's handling of Stephen Lawrence's murder in april nineteen ninety three And it's fair to say it sparked a national reckoning with institutional racism The Good Friday aggreement signed the previous year in april nineteen ninety eight had also brought fragile hope to Northern Ireland and the nineteen ninety nine Kosovo warar in Southeast Europe was dominating the headlines. Closer to home, the age of consent for gay men remains set at twenty one, five years higher than for straight couples. meaning that same sex relationships between consent and adults were still in the eyes of the law unequal. It was into this highly charged atmosphere that David Copeland, this story's perpetrator, chose to detonate three nail bombs in England's capital city. Targeting Black Britons, the British Bangladeshi community and gay men. The attacks came at a moment when each of those communities were already highly visible in public debate Blin's campaign was not random calculated to inflame the tensions of the time I'll also forewarn you that this episode contains heavy themes including racism, fascism and homophobia And there may be language included in the form of quotes that makes you squirm. I just want to make you aware of that at the start Also, this is an incredibly complex case with many victims, some of whom lost their lives as a result of Copeland's actions To ensure the timeline is put across in as easily a digestible way as possible, I deem discussing Copeland's background to be the best place to start Copplland was born in Isleworth, West London to his parents, Stephven and Caroline Later raised in the Hampshire town of Yatley, his classmates and teachers described him as a quiet and introverted student who received a great deal of abuse from bullies His parents described him as sweet natured, though admitted he had struggled with his mental health Despite Copeland's later claims to the police that his family were mentally abusive, accusing him of being gay and disliking him Dad maintained that Copeland had a normal loving childhood and that his comments were likely as a result of his mental instability Stephen said the following about Copeland's accusations regarding his sexuality. I have never thought Day was anything but one hundred percent heterosexual It is not true that we dragged him off to see a doctor because we were concerned about his physical development Dave asked his mother to take him because he felt he was short for his age He never said anything about it humiliating him. I believe it was as his paranoia grew, it all became twisted in his mind Copeland was five foot three for reference and reportedly had sadistic fantasies, including murdering his fellow classmates, something which began at the age of twelve And he often dream of being reincarnated as an SS officer surrounded by sex slaves SS stands for Schutstaffel or Protection squad in English, and they were the Nazi spepecial police force who provided security and administered the concentration camps Pitland would often read biographies of Adolf Hitler. and became privately obsessed with the idea of becoming famous Infamous is a more uppt term for what he wanted He studied at Yateley Comprehensive School and received seven GCSEs in total So it seems, like many of his peers, he was reasonably switched on from an education perspective Stephven added to that when he said As a teenager, he had friends They came to our house and he went to theirs can only say everything about him was normal. One of Copeland's former peers at the school had this to say about him He seemed harmless It didn't seem to have a problem with any of the black kids in Ia He didn't show any sort of violent behaviour So from the outside, it seemed as though Copeland was your regular run of the mill high school kid who had a big decision to make when it came to what the next stage of his life would look like The typical dilemma is whether you pursue further education or dive head first into the world ofare Leaving school at the age of sixteen, Copeland opted for the latter and worked various jobs, including as an engineer's assistant on the London Underground. He also worked as a roofer, a fencer and a McDonald's worker Losing plenty of roles along the way, Copeland was rumored to blame immigrants for being sacked court had saying the following to the police I think perfectly, British people have the right to ethnic cleanse You know the British people didn't ask these people over They were brought over for the main reason as cheap labor And every white man now and woman has to work cheap labour A lover of music, the heavier the better also tried to start a band, often taking inspiration from heavy metal icons such as Iron Maiden. But he struggled to adapt to adult life and not just in a sense of being able to hold down a steady job Running ins with the law were frequent His offensces were typically classed as petty crime But he also used drugs heavily and regularly hired sex workers Regarding the former, Class As were the ones he navigated towards. I'm talking cocaine, crack, heroin Copland had three minor convictions for common assault, making off without a payment as well as criminal damage put it down to immaturity and rebelliousness. Nothing else, his dad said after the fact Stephven believed the turning point in his son's life actually came on his brother's sixteenth birthday After a row with her husband, Caroline walked out on Stehven and never returned The following morning, Stephven had to break the news to his sons, which Stephven felt may have triggered Copeland's mental illness Caroline believed her ex husband blamed her because he was still bitter about their divorce She said A prison visit, I asked David if my leaving affected him And he said, No, Mum There was no reason for him to hate people We didn't know anyone as far as I'm aware, who was homosexual There weren't many black people at his school All I can think is that when he finally left home to live in London, something must have happened. somethingomet was going on in his head. It must have been so lost and unhappy Done Done Coppland himself never mentioned his parents' divorce as having any significant effect on him And it seems his phobias had set root long before his mum left the family home He later told the police his hatred of gay men stemmed from childhood and was a reaction to his parents thinking he was gay. He recalled how when he was thirteen, they sang the theme tune to the Flintstones and seemed to emphasize the lyrics We'll haveave a gay old Time. tolled that his muma then asked him if he wanted to confide any secrets parents dismissed that, saying the episode was a figment of Copeland's imagination Stephen remembered an occasion when a nineteen year old Copeland was challenged about his sexuality by his grandma She asked him What's up with y you, David Do you like boys becausecause you haven't got a girlfriend That was the only time the subject of his sexuality was raised Afterwards, Copeland vowed never to speak to his grandma again St even noted it was around that time when Copeland really slipped away from normality He dropped everything even taking himself away from his friends and family opting instead to lock himself away in his own little chrysalis Then on july twenty seventh, nineteen ninety six across the pond in the USA. The pivotal event took place during the summer Olympics Eric Robert Rudolph planted a bomb in Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, Georgia with the subsequent blast killing one woman, forty four year old Alice Hawthorne, and injuring over a hundred others. Copeland watched news reports from the scene He had a thought that is difficult to comprehend He wondered why nobody had bombed the Notting Hill Carnival in West London. It was an idea he simply couldn't get out of his head and woke up months later, vowing to do it himself I am the first domino, he said to one psychiatrist Id in Everything else will fall In nineteen ninety seven, Copeland moved to East London to work with his dad as an engineer's commissioning assistant on the Jubilee extension line, on which work had begun back in nineteen ninety three In May of nineteen ninety seven at the age of twenty one, he joined the British National Party and attended two meetings, including one which was ambushed by the Anti Nazi League He also briefly served as a steward at some of the party's events The British National Party or BNP is a far right political party here in the UK if you're unaware And around the time of this story, it was arguably approaching its peak popularity. Anti Nazi League, as you'd expect, opposed everything parties such as the BMP stood for A spy who embedded himself within the BMP at the time said that people spoke of an uprising and handed out Nazi propaganda along with bomb manuals Dave from Barking was what that person nicknamed Copeland in his notes before the bombings adding that they hadd spoken a fair bit, bonding over music professing his hatred towards quote Brown faces. Four months later, he rang the party's administration office to cancel his subscription and denounce the BMP for refusing to countenance a paramilitary struggle partarty commonly described as fascist when John Tyindall was chairman, he was in charge during our main timeline It was even labeled as No Nate So you can see why Copeland was interested in the BMP. Tyindall was said to have been very clever with his words, manipulative basically. An ex member of the party said the BMP was full of misfits, lunatics and losers That's what Tindall wanted because he could control them The honest truth is that Copand would have been brainwashed just like the rest of the people who joined In nineteen ninety eight, Copeland joined the National Socialist Moment or NSM, another neo Nazi group who were thought to be the political wing of Combat eighteen And that's an organization which Canada has officially labeled terrorist. The eighteen in combat eighteen or C eighteen represents the first and eight letters in the alphabet by the way, AH I'm sure you can work out whose name those letters represent is'sdolf Hitler. Eapland was recruited by NSM's self styled leader, Tony Williams, an appointed Hampshire organizer It was a rather grand title for what was realistically a small job The onlyia doz are members at the time, and the organization itself collapsed completely after Copeland's later arrest Also in nineteen ninety eight, Copeland saw his doctor twice and was prescribed Mild antidepressants to help him cope with anxiety attacks He told his GP it was losing his mind, which is incredibly revealing And nobody doubted that Copeland was suffering from some form of mental illness though the severity of his condition was contested We'll talk about that a bit more when we discuss his trial In early nineteen ninety nine, just weeks before the start of his bombing campaign Capland was living alone in a rented bedsit on Sunny Bank Road in the Hampshire village of Cove Without going into too much detail, Copeland was a self taught bomb maker. Using the internet, he learned how to create those deadly weapons and used none other than fireworks which could be bought over the counter to source the gunpowder for his bombs At one point he ordered so many fireworks that he had to book a taxi to take himself home to his bedsit because he couldn't carry that many experimented to check the bombs would work in his bedsit and again on his local common. And with that bit of practice done He deemed himself ready to launch the first of what would be three deadly attacks in London We're going to take an ad break here when we return, we'll discuss the timeline of Copeland's first nail bomb See you soon Welcome back. Let's now get straight into that men timeline On the morning of Saturday april seventeenth, nineteen ninety nine Chaplin sat alone in his bedsit, reportedly after spending around fifteen hundred hours assembling what lay in front of him Trude but devastating pipe bomb powder and filled with four inch nails Once complete, he placed the device inside a black head branded sports bag, slung it over his shoulder, and cycled a mile and a half to Farnbber station By mid afternoon at around three PM, Copeland arrived at Clapham Junction From there, he took a taxi south into Brixton Brixton Market was busy as it always was on a Saturday Sopers filled Electric Avenue, moving between stalls, supermarkets and cafes A kind of place where a bag left unattended didn't immediately raise any alarm bells Eland wandered through the market, blending in easily All the while, taking his time Carefully looking for the right spot And eventually He found it At four fifty PM he placed the bag outside a supermarket and walked away, having already set the timer on the device inside. It was counting down to five twenty five PM Less than half an hour later at five eighteen PM. Three young men noticed the bag near a bus stop on Electric Avenue It looked brand new and therefore a tad out of place. So they did what many people might do T up. But something didn't feel right, and after growing wary of it, they set it down again This time outside a nearby boots is the UK's leading health and Butauty retailer for any non locals listening The discussion about what to do with their find soon spread to some bystanders, who nudged forward to have a closer look. Someone even joked that it was a bomb. And it was all fun and games until one of them peered inside and said, this was no joke One onlooker moved the bank to a less crowded spot outside an Iceland supermarket They didn't realize it at the time, but that action was later credited as being the reason there were fewer casualties that day Various people looked inside the bag, not knowing what to do in such a foreign situation. until one guy suddenly took the bomb out before taking off with just a bag One witness later said Everyone was saying to him, There's a bomb in there. Leave it alone But he just wanted the bag, which was brand new ed out the bomb, which was a lunch box sitting on top of a cardboard box putut it on a pallet, then walked off So the bomb was now amongst packing materials on the side of the street exposed on top of the pallet The site must have been terrifying Batteries, nails, wires, and a round clock which was ticking. Police were finally summoned at five twenty one PM by the manager of the Iceland supermarket But even he was not one hundred percent certain that it was a real bomb when he r ph to the emergency services As a result, he did not follow the police's advice to move people away from the device Two squad cars arrived on the scene around eight minutes later, with police officers running into the market, shouting move, move, move. But they were too late. Just seconds later, the bomb exploded, emitting a boom so loud that it was heard a mile away The victim list makes for grim reading Fty eight people were injured in total twoo of whom lost their left eyes Several of the victims suffered perforated eardrums and experienced temporary hearing loss Multiple victims suffered fractures to their legs, feet and ankles. One victim had severe damage to his facial nerve And even a twenty three month old baby boy had a nail embedded in his skull, which penetrated into the outer layer of his brain The door of a van also got partly blown up its hinges due to the blast And a fifteen year old lad was left with a hole in his foot after he pulled a three inch nail out of it before being taken to the hospital Another younger victim had a nail in his leg I didn't want to wear aretcher Many of the victims were taken to St. Thomas's hospital where it was reported that three patients required general anesthesia for the removal of nails and shrapnel The metetropolitan police anti terrorist branch quickly took over the investigation and called in a detective who'd only just taken on the role He was supposed to start on the Monday but was asked to start earlier due to the attack On the Sunday, police asked anyone who may have been in the area if they knew anything about what had happened. walking around with a questionnaire that people could physically fill in peopleeople in the local area felt overpiced and under prrotected anyway because the nineteen eighty one Brixton riot wasn't a faraway memory at that time So many didn't want to cooperate The team of police officers was set up to review the CCTV footage for twenty four hours around the clock, as the borough had one of the best CCTV monitoring systems available in London At time, the cameras operated off cassette tapes, so the police had to go around and gather them individually before going through them And as with so many CCTV images, even nowadays They were of such poor quality. point where the MET sent them to NASA in the United States for specialist enhancement One piece of footage which would eventually prove useful, was spotted on april twenty third It showed a white man with a sports bag walking in the market area shortly before the explosion day later on april twenty fourth, exactly one week after the first attack Fapland finished his second homemade bomb and tralled to London on the same route he had before, heading to Brick Lane this time. Brlland traveled to the heart of London's East End, with the intention of attacking the Bangladeshi communer at Bricklare Market Arriving at around three ten PM, Copeland realized something was wrong with his plan. Instead of the usual bustling streets that normally host to the market Barrin It was at that point he realized the primary day for the market was Sunday, not Saturday bomb about to go off, Copeland walked down the street and left another sports bag, Rbok branded this time, containing the second nail bomb on Hanbrush Street in Spitittlefields, just off Brick Lane He left it between two vans parked outside a restaurant there. At around five thirty PM, a passerby picked up the unattended sports bag, next walking some two or three hundred meters to his car. Once there, he placed the bag inside his Ford Sierra and opened it, thinking he'd found some tools but suddenly, occurred to him that he may have stumbled across another bomb suchuch was the widespread publicity of the previous week's attack He intended to hand it in at Brickleane Police Station, but soon discovered it was closed He phoned the authorities instead and placed the bag back in the boot of his car Detonated at five fifty four PM Now because the boot or trunk was closed, Most of the blast was absorbed by the vehicle. And therefore the casualty count were lower than at Brixton Even so, the nails tralled two hundred and fifty feet up the road, damaging nearby buildings and vehicles, while also injuring thirteen people in the process Many locals believe they'd experienced an earthquake, such was the force of the explosion Police quickly recognized the attack as being the second strike in a bombing campaign The investigation was formally linked with the Brixton inquiry and intensified And given the locations where they went off, they decided it was clearly a series of racially motivated attacks Media outlets used demos of how many nails were packed into the bomb on TV to prompt people's memory of who came into the shop to buy such an amount, someomeone who didn't appear to be a builder There was even a ten grand reward put up. which equates to around nineteen point five thousand in today's money when adjusted for inflation. The breakthrough came in the week following the second blast, when on april twenty ninth, an a terrorist branch detectives released a CCTV image of their prime suspect. The young white man seen carrying a sports bag in Brixton to the National press The image was given wide publicity across the UK colleague of Coropeland's who worked with him on the Jubilee line extension recognized him straight away A colleague phoned the police to name Copeland as the suspect. And as it would happen, that tip off reached the police approximately an hour and twenty minutes before the third bomb exploded in Soho And because Copeland had already left his bedsit with the device, it could not be intercepted in time to prevent that third blast which he'd brought forward due to the release of his image in the papers His original plan was to detonate the third bomb on Saturday may first, making it three Saturdays in a row but he instead decided to detonate it on the Friday evening in a pub called the Admiral Duncan. The Admiral Duncan had been trading since the early eighteen hundreds, but in recent years had become an established gay bar. It was a small, narrow pub with low ceilings, and it reminded some patrons of a Cornish smugglers' pub The bow was known for its small and intimate vibe Copeland woke up in a London hotel on the morning of april thirtieth, having stayed up the previous night making his third bomb. If we skip ahead to around five twenty five PM that day, you'll notice all three attacks took place at around the same time. It was at that point Kopplin's colleague tipped off the police as to his identity. But by six PM, Copeland had already entered the Admiral Duncan Pub at number fifty four old Compton Street in the heart of Europe's first recognised gay village, and he'd placed a sports bike containing the final nail bomb beneath a bar stool before leaving He was in and out within the space of a few minutes, heading to the bar like he wanted a drink before slipping the bag off his shoulder and putting it on the floor At six thirty seven PM, the bomb detonated inside the crowded pub and what was a warm Friday night at the start of the early May Bank holiday weekend That third blast was actually twenty seven years ago today, if you listen to this episode on the Day of release The patron who survived the blast described the bomb going off as a blue light, adding that he didn't even hear a loud bang but afterwards heard a sound like cabling being ripped out of the building People were killed in the third attack between seventy nine and ' eighty three were injured. Sources vary on the precise figure F of whom later required amputations We're going to take one final ad break now. When we get back, we'll discuss the three people who died as a result of the Admiral Duncan pub attack See you soon Welcome back I'll now discuss those three innocent people who lost their lives that day at the hands of Copeland's homemade bomb. Andrea Maria Dykes was twenty seven years old at the time of her murder. She was born on november thirtieth, nineteen seventy one and was the eldest daughter of Philip and Franis Maddock attended St. Benedict's Catholic College in Colchester, leaving the school in nineteen eighty eight After her death, roughly a third of the then current staff still remembered a fondler And around seventy mourners attended a memorial mass organized at the college by the then principal, after numerous requests from Andrea's former school friends She earned a living working as a bingohole worker in the Colchester area And in august nineteen ninety seven, aged twenty five, she married Julian Mark Dykes with the marriage registered in the Colchester Registration District The wedding was held at Staint Mary's parish Church in Wivvenhor which is tragically the same church where her funeral was later held The evening before, a special mass was held for her at Stt James the Less and St. Helens's in Priory Street, Colchester At the time of her death, Andrea was four months pregnant with her first child Boy, the couple had decided to name Jordan which makes what happened all the more devastating To celebrate the pregnancy and his invitation to be Godfather, John Light, who is a close friend of Julian's and best man at their wedding treated Andrea and Julian to tickets to see the Aber musical Mama Mia at the Prince Edward Theatre in the West End on the fateful night of april thirtieth nineteen ninety nine Before the show, the group made up of Andrea, Julian, John, John's partner Gary and their friend Nick Moore, went into the addmiral Duncan on O Compton Street Soho P sure drinks. When the nail bomb exploded, Andrea and Nick were killed instantly at the scene. with John Later dying in hospital after four operations Andrea's husband suffered extensive burns, had nails lodged in his lungs, and his hands took the full force of the blast He was in a coma for around three weeks. and was not told of Andrea's death or the loss of their unborn son until he regained consciousness John Light had only recently turned thirty two at the time of his murder, having been born on april twenty seventh, nineteen sixty seven to his parents Dennis and Betty Light Like Gandria, he also lived in the Essex city of Colchester, sharing his home with his partner Gart He worked in the bingo industry in the city and had been deputy manager at the Gala Bingo Club in Osborne Street for eight years. That's how we knew Andrea. they'd been colleagues Five months before his death, he'd been promoted to general manager of a Gala Bingo club in Wokingham Berkshire and had moved there accordingly On the evening of april thirtieth, John travelled to London from Colchester with Andrea, Julian and Gary to see the show Meting up with Nick in the West End Unlike Andrea and Nick, John did not die immediately after the bomb went off However, his wounds were so severe that surgeons could not keep up with the blood and fluid loss, and he died approximately twenty four hours later in hospital. His funeral service was held at Wimple Road Methodist Church in Colchester on may seventeenth of that year and was followed by a cremation The service was conducted by the Reverend Robert Bean, and hundreds of mourners attended, including his parents who'd travelled up from Plymouth in Devon hisis family released a statement which read deevastated to lose Johon to such a senseless act of violence Jean was a popular, loving, well respected man who enjoyed nothing more than being with all his friends As for Nick, his full name was Nicholas Paul Moore and he was born on may twenty fourth, nineteen sixty seven, making him thirty one at the time of his murder. He had a brother named Martin and a sister named Carolyine and his family's connections were in Felixore, Suffolk, where his funeral was later held, and his parents were associated At the time of his death, thoy was living in London, hence the other forall met him there and he didn't travel with them from Colchester After leaving school, he had a series of jobs before serving in the Merchant Navy and subsequently in the RAF in the Signals unit He later worked as an administrator at British Aerospace in Saudi Arabia and later in Australia. Nick had been friendly with Andrea and Julian for several years, hence his invitation to the musical that evening His funeral service was held at Stt John the Baptist Church in Felix Stow on may fourteenth, nineteen ninety nine and was attended by a congregation of more than three hundred mourners Reverend Canon Kenneth Wakefield described Nick as the life and soul of the pter and said how he had loved the community atmosphere of S her He said the reason for the bombing was beyond understanding It was so senseless, so wrong, he said We cannot possibly understand the circumstances which led to his death. His brother Martin addressed the congregation and made an impassioned plea for an end to prejudice saying The reason Nick is lying dead is because of prejudice It is really important Jesus taught us that we must love everybody in the world People of all religions and colours and all sexual orientations, it is really important I want this message to get through to everybody bring up your children prejudiced They couldn't have said it any better I could have Very wise words from Martin they're in such a devastating situation All three who lost their lives, Andrea, John and Nick, were later commemorated on a memorial plaque beside three trees planted in St. Anne's Gardens off Wardor Street in Soho. A man called Gary Reid, who was forty three at the time and from New Zealand, was badly burned and injured by shrapnel, while also losing one of his legs in the blast at the Admiral Duncan. He described the aftermath of the bomb going off, starting by describing a woman who was moving her mouth and looking at him It turned out she was shouting, but his eardrums had burst, so he was temporarily deaf and couldn't hear her Another man, forty eight year old Tommy Douglas, was at the bar when the bomb detonated He suffered catastrophic injuries, resulting in the amputation of both legs below the knee As a result of the blast, he had to use a wheelchair and wear a callostomy bag Tommy later described Copeland as not a human being and baged to the core during the trial opposing the defense' stance that Copeland was mentally ill Following the attack, Tommy became a vocal figure in advocating for the victims and speaking against hate crime before passing away in twenty seventeen time of the blast in the midst of the total carnage land was in a nearby hotel. C casually watching the breaking news on the telele basking in the devastation he'd caused By the early hours of may first, met police flying squad and anti terrorist branch officers had raided Copeland's bedsit in Cove And inside found two large Nazi flags hanging on the wall, as well as a collection of newspaper clippings about the bombings. Disturbingly, his victims and photographs of him were also dotted about, along with even more explosive materials and photographs of Nazi imagery When officers knocked on the door, Copeland opened it. his eyes and mumbled Yeah. They were all down to me did them on my own. placed under arrest and on his way to Charing Cross Police station for questioning. Sapland allegedly sang at the top of his voice, seeming almost jubilant He saw his arrest as his little moment of fame The next day, Copeland, who was just twenty two was charged with three counts of murder and three counts of causing explosions with intent to endanger life It was soon revealed by Copeland in a subsequent interview that his aim was to cause a race war My main intent was to spread fear, resentment and hatred throughout this country, he said It was to cause a racial war He then proceeded to give the officers an extensive amount of detail on how he did it adding that they didn't regret a thing nor feel bad for any of the victims, with the exception of pregnant Andrea. attempt to get Copeland to open up while he was on remand, the police took on the identity of a woman they'd made up ironically called Patsa Capin spoke to her through letters Patsy was a blonde aryan ideal who was subservient and an airhead, the police said Patsy would remark on how handsome Copeland was, idolizing him in the process And he bought it signing off his letters with Love David, which was a clear escalation in his feelings Sland eventually opened up about the doctors who were trying to assess him in prison claiming that he'd fooled them into thinking he was mad and that he was going to get through the trial Those omissions were how the police proved he was lying about his mental capacity Now remember that spy who infiltrated the BMP who I mentioned earlier He was actually one of the main people responsible for aiding Copeland's conviction because he helped confirm his identity once that tip from his colleague came in Cuplin's trial began in june two thousand at the Old Baililey in London before Mrter Justice Michael Hyam land pleaded guiltty to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility but not guilty to murder Five psychiatrs had diagnosed him with paranoid schizophrenia with another finding only a personality disorder but stating it was not serious enough for him to avoid a murder charge That last claim came from the prosecution psychiatrist, the other five were the defensers When Copeland was assessed at Broadmore Hospital, it was shown as victim's injuries He didn't flinch at the images Yet when he was informed that Pat say it was not a real person He reacted by slumping into his chair with his head in his hands The prosecution, led by Nigel Sweenen atQC rejected the Diminished responsibility plea The crown argued Copeland knew exactly what he was doing and that his actions were driven by political ideology, not mental illness The jury ultimately agreed with the prosecution and convicted Copeland on june thirtieth of murder times three and causing explosions with intent to endanger life times three thereby rejecting the diminished responsibility plea outright mister Justice Higham sentenced Copeland to six concurrent life sentences and recommended he serve a minimum of thirty years behind bars, though he told the court he doubts it will ever be safe to release him The judge told Copeland Nothing can excuse or justify the evil you have done. and certainly not the abhorrent views which you have embraced. The case remains significant beyond the verdict itself, as it helped establish the framework by which UK courts subsequently approach lone actor far right terrorism It drew a clear distinction between ideological motivation and mental illness and made it plain that the two were not mutually exclusive. Copeland was imprisoned at H andP Franklland, a high security prison, and so his minimum term increased to fifty years in march two thousand seven under new legislation Meaning he will not be eligible to apply for parole until twenty forty nine Baplland challenged the fifty year minimum term in june twenty eleven at the Court of Appeal seeking to have it reducce closer to the original thirty year recommendation. The Court of appppeal chose to uphold the longer sentence and his appeal was dismissed Three years later, while being held at HMP Belmarsh, Copeland was involved in a violent incident with fellow inmate Thomas McDonner. After a dispute, Copeland fashioned a weapon from a toothbrush fitted with two razor blades and the following day attacked MacDononna in the exercise yard slashing him twice across the face, leaving permanent scar in. Eapland was then overpowered by prison officers and taken to be placed in solitary confinement, where he remained for the next eleven months As a result of that attack, he appeared at Woolwich Crown Court in october twenty fifteen and pleaded guilty to wounding with intent, receiving an additional three years sentence, of which he will serve at least eighteen months The most recent news comes from twenty twenty one when it was reported that Copeland had converted to hislam during his time in prison claim he hopes to be reborn in a different body after death get at the same time if the reporting is accurate has requested inmates and security call him Saddam in admiration of the Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein We're going to end with a bit about the legacy of this case because it's changed the legal landscape for LGBT people in the UK almost beyond recognition In the year two thousand, the age of consent for gay men was finally equalized at sixteen.