Prisoner serving life term who stabbed guard in terrorist attack ran Facebook account from jail

From the Telegraph.

One of Britain’s most dangerous terrorists who is serving a life term for the attempted murder of a prison officer has been operating a Facebook site from jail, The Telegraph can reveal.

Baz Hockton, a Muslim convert who stabbed a prison officer inside the maximum security Whitemoor prison, has Facebook posts that mock his current incarceration in the high-security Strangeways jail, in defiance of a blanket ban on telephones and internet access.

In the first ever terror attack inside a UK jail, Hockton, 27, and his accomplice, Brusthom Ziamani, 26, attempted to stab to death “kind and helpful” Neil Trundle at HMP Whitemoor, Cambridgeshire, on January 9 2020.They planned it in advance, crafting makeshift weapons from twisted metal with fabric-covered grips, fake suicide vests and a martyrdom letter.

Ziamani was five years into a 19-year sentence for a 2014 plot to behead a soldier, inspired by the murder of Lee Rigby. Hockton was three years into a 12-year jail term for an unprovoked stabbing attack and concurrent 10-year sentence for wounding a fellow prisoner.

…a Facebook site in his name was still live last week. “Inbox me all your details and I will send you some Xmas money, bro,” said one post.

Professor Ian Acheson, a former prison governor and government adviser on extremism in jails, said: “Here is another example of a state institution being humiliated by failing to notice what purports to be a convicted terrorist offender who almost killed a prison officers being able to operate online.

“If he is able to operate a phone, it is another catastrophic system failure. This is one of the most iconic and dangerous offenders who almost carried out the first ever terrorist murder of a prison officer in Britain. How are they allowing him access to a Facebook site? And why is a platform like Facebook allowing him to brazenly boast about his exploits? ”

The Telegraph contacted the Ministry of Justice last week to alert them to the Facebook site. Within hours, officials asked Facebook to take it down, which the social media giant immediately acted onHowever, it declined to respond to questions as to why a Facebook site for a known criminal and terrorist – identified as such on his site – should have remained live through and beyond his conviction for the attack. He was jailed for life in October 2020 and will serve a minimum 23 years

Facebook are very quick to take down other accounts of respectable people like me, and many of my friends for expressing opinions which do not fit current mores.

The MoJ said anyone found with a phone faced extra time behind bars.