A Midlands-based white supremacist pleaded guilty to stirring up racial and anti-LGBT+ hatred by sharing over 130 extremist images and materials on the Russian social media platform VKontakte (VK).
Richard Osborne, 53, often posted graphic, dehumanising racist materials on his VK profile – ranging from Holocaust denial and trivialisation, anti-Jewish and anti-Black cartoons published on an infamous US-based white supremacist website in the early 200s, to content calling for the violent removal of Muslim, Jewish, and Black communities from the UK and Europe, our investigation unearthed. Other disturbing posts linked Muslims to bestiality.
Osborne, who uploaded photographs of his membership card for the neo-fascist National Front, further shared violent LGBT+ content, calling for their violent removal from Europe.
On September 4, 2021, he shared a video promoting the banned neo-Nazi terror group National Action that propagated the racist myth of a so-called “white genocide”.
Within this violent, racist and anti-LGBT+ echo chamber, our investigation found that throughout 2021 and after that, Osborne interacted with another convicted white supremacist – 63-year-old David Hutchinson, even lamenting his jailing.
His appearance at Birmingham Crown Court, where he will appear again for sentencing next month, revealed that the offences occurred between February 16, 2022, and January 9, 2023.
Other guilty pleas concerned the possession of a shotgun without a licence and an offensive cosh weapon.
The BBC stated that Osborne appeared before the court via a video link from HMP Wandsworth in south London.
Sentencing will occur at Birmingham Crown Court on June 9.