| Hateland -
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30/06/00 - Racist nailbomber
Copeland full of hatred
By Bill Rosato
Surrounded by Nazi regalia in his bedroom, David Copeland
made the nailbombs that killed three people, wounded 139
and sowed terror in London last year.
A baby boy with a nail lodged in his skull, a young
bride dead along with her unborn child, amputated limbs
and horrific injuries from flying glass are the legacies
of his campaign.
Copeland, a small figure with a cowlick at the back
of his head, was behind the series of attacks aimed
at the capital's homosexuals, blacks and Asians with
weapons designed to wreak maximum damage and fear.
A jury convicted the 24-year-old engineer of three
murders on Friday before the judge sentenced him to
life in prison.
"I believe in what I believed in and I took that
belief to the extreme," Copeland said during police
questioning. "If no one remembers who you were,
then you never existed. My aim was political. It was
to cause a racial war in this country."
His crude devices were packed with nails up to six
inches (15 cm) long and placed in the largely black
area of Brixton on a busy Saturday, the Bangladeshi
community of Brick Lane on what Copeland thought was
market day and a pub in central London's Soho on a Friday
evening.
HEROES WERE HITLER AND SADDAM
"I think perfectly British people have the right
to ethnically cleanse," Copeland told police. He
said he used nailbombs because they were "lethal
bombs".
"They'd smash windows, stick into people and maim
people," he said. "And kill people."
Copeland, who said he took his inspiration from the
1996 bombing at the Atlanta Olympics, rejoiced in the
pain.
The walls in the one room he rented in the sleepy town
of Cove in southern England were covered with newspaper
cuttings about the bombings and other atrocities.
"I just liked them. You know it's just evil you
know, I mean people suffering," Copeland told police.
Under police questioning, Copeland said he venerated
Adolf Hitler and Saddam Hussein and revealed he was
ultra right-wing, racist and homophobic. But he insisted
he was different from others who embraced similar beliefs.
"I wouldn't trust anyone of those idiots (in racist
groups). They're just a bunch of yobs," Copeland
told police. "They're just trying to take my glory."
PACE QUICKENED AS POLICE CLOSED IN
Copeland told psychiatrists he grew up believing he
was a "short nobody" after his parents sent
him for growth treatment at the age of 13.
His parents also derided him for being homosexual,
which he was not, and sang the "Flintstones"
soundtrack with emphasis on the line "a gay old
time", Copeland told psychiatrists.
He also said he had fantasies in which he was an SS
officer who raped and then killed whoever he wanted.
With his crossbow, knives, explosives and information
from the Internet, Copeland dreamed about creating an
Aryan state. He told police he would have kept on bombing
until he was caught.
When Copeland heard police had released a photo of
him, he quickened the pace, checking into hotels under
different names before detonating his most devastating
bomb in a Soho pub frequented by homosexuals.
Closed circuit television pictures collated by police
as part of "Operation Marathon" showed Copeland
walking down busy London streets casually toting bags
of explosives, even stopping to peek into one near a
busy taxi rank.
Other pictures show him walking away bagless, his job
done. |
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