Brogan Stewart liked to refer to himself as the “Führer” in his group chat with fellow neo-Nazis. At his home in Tingley, a village in northern England, a swastika flag hung on his bedroom wall. On Jan. 23 last year, Mr. Stewart, then 24, wrote in a private Telegram chat: “The time for talk is now over. Unknown to him, three of the seven people on that call on Feb. 5, 2024, were undercover operatives deployed by counterterrorism police and MI5, the British security service. All these details were recounted at a two-month trial at Sheffield Crown Court, where last week Mr. Stewart and two co-conspirators, Christopher Ringrose, 35, and Marco Pitzettu, 26, were sentenced to between eight and 11 years in prison for “preparing acts of terrorism.” All three men had denied the charge, and told the trial that they were not in reality planning violence, but instead engaging in edgy “banter” that aimed to shock.

Source: The Times October 22, 2025 08:33 UTC