Left-wing anarchist guilty of terror offences after declaring he wanted to kill MPs
A left-wing anarchist has been found guilty of preparing acts of terrorism by compiling and sharing a bomb-making manual, after declaring that he wanted to kill at least 50 politicians.
Jacob Graham, 20, from Norris Green, Liverpool, dedicated his manual, called the “Freedom Encyclopaedia”, to “terrorists past and future, anarchists etc” and buried bomb-making chemicals in a secret woodland hide.
He wrote a document called “My Plan” in which he said he wanted to kill at least 50 people by attacking government buildings and politicians’ houses.
He also made 138 videos in which he demonstrated explosives and talked about “Judgement Day” and “standing up for working class people.”
On the wall in his bedroom Graham had printed out a picture of a car bomb exploding with the words: “Make politicians afraid to start their cars again.”
The jury at Manchester Crown Court acquitted Graham of planning a terrorist attack but found him guilty of preparing acts of terrorism by writing the Freedom Encyclopaedia, and of disseminating terrorist publications and possession of documents useful for terrorism.
He will be sentenced in March.
‘I have so much carnage to commit’
Graham bought a number of chemicals on the internet and conducted experiments in his back garden before burying some of the ingredients in Formby Woods, recording the location so he could return to the cache.
He also had all the computer files necessary to make a 3D-printed assault rifle called an FGC9 MkII and the printer on which to make it.
Graham came to idolise an American terrorist called Theodore Kaczynski – known as the Unabomber – after watching a Netflix series called Manhunt, and pledged to “finish what he started”, his trial heard.
From a remote cabin in Montana, Kaczynski carried out a 17-year mail bombing campaign, in which he targeted tech academics at universities, killing three people and injuring 23.
A pipe bomb made by Graham
A cache of chemicals was discovered at Graham’s home
He conducted experiments in his back garden
Graham made video diaries in which he recorded himself wearing a headset and speaking into the camera from his bedroom, with a teddy bear on the bed behind him.
He was motivated by a hatred of government, which he saw as oppressing working-class people, and had developed ecological concerns about pollution, destruction of forests, and the exploitation of natural resources.
Wearing a T-shirt and glasses, he said at one point: “I’ve got everything I need to start my revolution.”
Graham told police he was “left-wing” but “more like an anarchist” adding: “I don’t like the idea of a central control and I don’t really like the monarchy.”
His ideal government would be the size of “Merseyside or Liverpool”, he said, adding that he supported the Green Party and was an “environmentalist” who did not like the way that “corporations act and how they damage the Earth.”
“I think it is fair to say I was quite anti-government,” Graham told his trial. “I didn’t agree with the idea of it – the way certain things were handled, the pandemic, the cost of living.
“I didn’t agree with a group of small people being able to make decisions that affect a mass.”
Graham made a series of video diaries from his room
In a video on 21 June, Graham took out a machete with a red handle and tapped the blade, saying: “Can’t end my life yet, I have so much carnage to commit.”
In another video made in his bedroom on 9 August, Graham said: “If terrorism is standing up for what you think is right, standing up for the working class people of this country, most of us can’t afford to heat our homes or afford food, there needs to be someone to fix this problem. It is my responsibility to do this.”
He added: “I will be a homegrown terrorist because I was born on British soil. If they want to call me a justice warrior or a hero, call me that. If they want to call me scum, call me that because I won’t be here to listen to all of it.”
In another video, he threatened to attack Hugh Baird College, which he attended, saying: “I’m f****** ready, f****** bring it. I don’t care, I’ll kill every single last one of them.”
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Encyclopaedia for terrorists
Graham, who lived with his mother, sister and sister’s boyfriend, had downloaded a compendium of terrorist publications including the Mujahideen Handbook and the White Resistance Manual, which he stored in a folder called “Alexandria” after the fabled ancient library.
Graham used Discord and the encrypted Telegram app to communicate with others who shared his hatred of government in groups called Earth Militia, Total Earth Liberation and Neo-Luddite Action.
He shared his manual online – which included instructions on how to build a pipe bomb, gunpowder and plastic explosives, along with detonators and instructions on how the perpetrators could evade the police.
Annabel Darlow KC, prosecuting, told the jury: “The mindset of Mr Graham permeates throughout his written material, messages, and homemade video diaries.
“He wished to bring about the downfall of government and society. He expressed the view that he was sick and tired of living in a society that was deteriorating and destroying itself.”
The 20-year-old had files to make a 3D-printed assault rifle
Chemicals cache
When Graham was arrested on 26 May last year, police found a number of chemicals, each of which could be used as ingredients in various explosive mixtures.
Graham told his trial he felt like a character in a James Bond or Mission Impossible film or The Last Of Us, a post-apocalyptic video game and TV show.
He said he was “doomsday prepping” for “some sort of possible invasion, civil war, martial law, natural disasters, solar flares, floods, things like that”.
How often do migrants successfully fight their removal from Britain on the basis of their human rights?
The clamour from the right for the UK to withdraw from the European Convention on Human Rights has been growing – even some high-profile Labour figures say it needs reform.
So, I’ve come to an immigration appeal court – unannounced – to find out how it is used by migrants and their lawyers here.
Decisions delayed, outcomes unpublished
I get to the fourth floor of a large court building in Birmingham.
The first case I’m ushered into to see is a 38-year-old Nigerian man. He came on a student visa – but that ran out.
Just before he did, he put in a claim to stay on the basis of his relationship with a woman, who is originally from Barbados but has lived and worked in Britain since 2015.
The judge, who will decide their fate, dials in via video link. He hears the man’s partner has a 17-year-old daughter.
She lives with her biological father, but the couple insist she is so close to the Nigerian man she calls him “Dad”. This is an appeal being made under Article 8 of the ECHR – the right to a family life.
The following day, it’s a different judge – this time he’s here in person.
The man in front of him is appealing against deportation to Kenya. He came to the UK as a baby with his mother and siblings.
As a teenager, he was jailed for almost 10 years for stabbing a man, causing serious injuries.
It emerges that his case is also based on Article 8 of the ECHR. Since leaving prison, he’s fathered a child who has just turned two.
There are arguments made too under Article 3 of the ECHR – which protects against torture and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment – due to the man being diagnosed with “generalised anxiety” and depression.
It will be a few weeks before decisions are made on these cases – and the results won’t be published by the court.
I leave, thinking how opaque the process feels.
It’s also easy to see why some politicians are pointing to the ECHR – a treaty signed after the Second World War to protect the rights of everyone in the Council of Europe – as a barrier to removing more migrants.
Between April 2008 and June 2021, 21,521 foreign nationals were due to be deported because of crimes they’d committed
Is the ECHR really a barrier to deportation?
“I think there’s a strong kind of political dynamic there which has led to, in some ways, you might say, a kind of scapegoating of the European Convention,” says Alice Donald, Professor of Human Rights law at Middlesex University, London.
She’s not convinced that withdrawal from ECHR would make a big difference to the number of people the UK is able to remove or deport.
“The honest answer is we don’t know, we don’t have enough data to say that,” she says.
“The data that we do have, for example, in relation to the number of human rights appeals against deportation by foreign national offenders, which has been very much in the news this year, suggests that it would really make only a marginal difference.”
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Those figures, published by the Home Office, reveal that between April 2008 and June 2021, 21,521 foreign nationals due to be deported because of crimes they’d committed appealed, and 2,392 were successful on human rights grounds only. That’s around 181 on average per year.
We don’t have figures for how many other types of immigrants are allowed to stay on the basis of human rights. Small boat migrants who claim asylum would usually rely on another convention.
“In terms of asylum claims, it is governed by the 1951 Refugee Convention as a different treaty,” Prof Donald explains.
“There is, of course, overlapping protection with the prohibition of torture in the European Convention… so if the Refugee Convention were still in place, then of course people seeking asylum would rely on that.”
She also believes there have been “a number of erroneous stories or exaggerated stories”.
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Reform would deport legal migrants
Debunking the chicken nugget myth
In February 2025, it was widely reported that an Albanian criminal’s deportation was halted over his son’s dislike of foreign chicken nuggets.
“What actually happened in that case is that it went to the upper tribunal (second-tier immigration appeal court) which ordered that he could be deported. And also specifically said that the evidence to do with chicken nuggets was nowhere near the level required,” Prof Donald says.
What leaving the ECHR would mean
Withdrawal from the ECHR would mean the guarantees it provides would be removed for everyone in the UK, not just migrants.
It not only protects the rights to life, liberty, fair trial and freedom of expression among others, but also prohibits torture, slavery and discrimination.
Pulling out of the treaty could also breach the Belfast Good Friday Agreement – though some say such an outcome is avoidable.
However, in a country where immigration is the top issue of concern for voters, there are some who now think that is a price worth paying.
The King and Queen will meet the new Pope during a state visit to Vatican City next month.
The couple will join Leo XIV, who was elected pope earlier this year after the death of Pope Francis, in late October to celebrate the 2025 jubilee year, Buckingham Palace said.
The Catholic Church typically marks a papal jubilee every 25 years.
Charles and Camilla‘s visit is expected to celebrate the ecumenical work by the Church of England and the Catholic Church, reflecting the Jubilee year’s theme of walking together as “Pilgrims of Hope”.
The King is Supreme Governor of the Church of England, a role which dates back to Henry VIII, who named himself Supreme Head of the Church of England after he was excommunicated by Pope Paul III and broke from the Catholic Church in the 16th century to marry Anne Boleyn.
The King and Queen had a meeting with Pope Francis just 12 days before he died.
The King and Queen meeting Pope Francis before his death. Pic: PA
Their historic state visit to the Vatican in early April was cancelled due to the then-pontiff’s poor health, but they managed to visit him privately during their trip to Italy.
The meeting with Francis, in what would be the final weeks of his life, was arranged at the last minute and took place on their 20th wedding anniversary on 9 April, with the pontiff wanting to personally wish them a happy anniversary.
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In an official message released following the news of Francis’s death on 21 April, the King said he and the Queen were “most deeply saddened”.
In May, Charles sent a private message to Pope Leo XIV congratulating him on his election, Buckingham Palace said.
Call handlers at the mental health helpline Samaritans are warning of a mass exodus of volunteers after the charity announced plans to close branches.
The ‘volunteer listeners’ say a shortage of people taking calls will lead to longer wait times to have them answered.
In July, Samaritans chief executive Julie Bentley said it was no longer sustainable to have so many branches.
In a video message to staff, seen by Sky News, she said: “Many of the branches we have today came into existence at a time when Samaritans was set up as a local service, providing separate local numbers. But that hasn’t been the case for some time.
“Our service today doesn’t need the number of buildings we currently have.”
Colm Martin, a volunteer listener for five years, said the announcement came “out of the blue”.
Colm Martin was left surprised by the announcement of closures
“We cannot make sense of it. This is supposed to be about improving a service and we can’t understand how closing half of all of the branches will improve the service or encourage more volunteers to come forward.”
Mr Martin says he thinks Samaritans will lose volunteers.
“Not because they want to leave, but because they’re forced out, because there isn’t a branch local to them that they can go to,” he said.
Last year, three million people called the Samaritans in need of support. Its website reads “every life lost to suicide is a tragedy”.
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About 23,000 trained volunteers work with the charity to listen and provide fast support to those experiencing suicidal thoughts as well as other mental health issues.
Ms Bentley told Sky News: “The improvements we’re proposing would mean callers getting through to Samaritans quicker while making it easier for anyone to join our amazing group of volunteers, regardless of their circumstances or busy lifestyles.
“Samaritans will continue to be there for those struggling to cope across the UK and Republic of Ireland, day and night, 365 days a year.”
Angela praised a Samaritans volunteer who helped her at a time when her father was dying
Surbiton-based Angela remembers calling Samaritans for help 40 years ago when her father was dying of cancer.
“Whenever I reached out to any family member, they’d say ‘oh come on, you’re strong, you know what you’re doing. You’re a nurse’, she said.
“One night, I just reached an emotional limit. It was about two o’clock in the morning, and I thought ‘I’m going to burst here’.”
Angela says she cannot recall how long the call lasted but says it was answered quickly.
“He hardly spoke, he just let me empty all my thoughts and he listened,” she said. “That was so powerful to have someone just listening and not interrupting, not dismissing my feelings.”
The charity is set to vote on the proposed changes, which would take place over the next seven to 10 years, this weekend, although in Ireland the consultation process is not due to start until 2027.
Anyone feeling emotionally distressed or suicidal can call Samaritans for help on 116 123 or email jo@samaritans.org in the UK.
Alternatively, you can call Mind’s support line on 0300 102 1234, or NHS on 111.
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