Bomb-maker who made 23 bombs and a ‘hate board’ featuring royal family and Obama jailed

A ‘Far right’ bombmaker got sentenced after police found 23 bombs, a ‘hate board’ and other paraphernalia during a search of his home in Bristol.

37-year old Matthew Glynn got tipped off by a colleague that reported him to the police after seeing some of the weapons and ‘hate board’ in his home.

When the police arrived at his home, Matthew agreed to a search of his house but asked if he could clean up first. Matthew said he had numerous swords and further asked if it would be classed as a terror incident.

During the search, police found a stash of various weapons and bomb-making equipment, a cache with hundreds of knives and axes was found. This included a Wolverine-style knife with four sharp blades, fuses, gas canisters, ball bearings, as well as books on explosives.

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The chemicals found included over 6kg of homemade explosive powder, a tennis ball hand grenade, several other homemade devices including one under his bed.

Matthew’s ‘hate board’ consisted of a dart board, with a collection of celebrity faces on and included Barack Obama, Justin Bieber, the Duchess of Cambridge, Cheryl Cole, a Somalian boy, and an elderly white man. The devices found by the police got described as “potentially fatal” and “effective.”

When the police looked at his social media history, they saw anti-Islamic and racial hatred on his Facebook pages. It included rants calling for the death penalty on terrorists and banning school trips to mosques.

After his arrest, Matthew told police that he no longer believed in those views he had expressed on Facebook, as Detective Inspector Dave Lewis told the court:

“When questioned about [his far-right views], he said that a woman had corrected his thinking. We've never identified that woman, we've never spoken to her.”

His explanation for the bombs was that he intended to set them off in an open area to see what they were capable of.

Later on, Matthew pled guilty to five counts for the making of explosive substances between January 1, 2016, and July 24, 2018. Judge Peter Blair QC said during sentencing that it was unlikely that Matthew would attack the public and intention lacked and got sentenced to 5 years in jail.

The Judge added that Matthew was someone with a “confused mind” rather than someone with a clear objective.

It might seem odd that someone who had a proven history supporting anti-Islamic factions and other ‘far right’ movements, with all the chemicals and weapons found at his home, that he would only get five years, with no mention of the terrorist act.

But according to the Crown Prosecution Service, and the Attorney General’s office, with Detective Inspector Dave Lewis as the lead of the investigation, they said:

“As with all investigations, we look into what motivates people. In the case of Matthew Glynn, we looked into what potentially was his motivating factors. We could find nothing else in his social media that suggested he’d carried on expressing right-wing views.”

Following lengthy interviews and the scrutinizing of his social media accounts, the police said that they were satisfied that Matthew was not a threat and held no value to those views anymore.

Matthew got away without being branded a terrorist, however, by sheer oversight, 70-year-old John Stevenson accidentally branded himself one.

John and his wife, 71-year-old Marion planned a trip to the United States for the holidays and to spend New Years in New York. The couple excitedly planned their trip and John organized the visa’s online.

By mistake, John ticked a wrong box on his visa application form and got denied, while his wife’s visa got approved.

The box John accidentally ticked yes on, was for a question that asked whether he had ever been involved in terrorist activities. After a tedious amount of effort, John’s visa finally got approved, ‘unticked’ as a terrorist once again.