Nazi-obsessed teenager who tried to behead Kurdish barber with an axe is jailed for more than 15 years

A Nazi-obsessed teenager who told a man to kill all Jews and Muslims and launched a far-right axe attack on a stranger outside a barber's shop has been jailed for more than 15 years.

Alina Burns, then aged 18, attacked Mohammed Mahmoodi, an Iranian Kurd, in Bedminster, Bristol, on 2 August last year as he was chatting with a friend.

Bristol Crown Court heard Burns had been motivated by neo-Nazi extremism and had been in contact with far-right groups.

CCTV from inside the shop showed the 27-year-old turning and ducking at the last minute as she swung an axe at his neck.

Mr Mahmoodi, who was much bigger than the 5ft 2in Burns, managed to wrestle the axe away from her before she could strike him again.

A nearby police officer heard the commotion and went to the scene in East Street and arrested Burns. They found a scalpel and several darts on her.

Burns nodded when the arresting officer asked her if she had swung the axe at the man. When he asked her why, she replied: "I wanted to cut his neck. I would do it again, but to succeed."

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After Burns was arrested, police discovered her links to far-right groups and extremism.

They later found an email she had written to a man she met on a dating app, saying: "Kill all Jews and Muslims in Britain, please."

At her home, detectives came across handwritten notes about the "spread of Islam", and how to use fertiliser to make explosives and nuclear weapons.

She was also found to have searched for information online about Jihad, the Southport stabbings and Nazi Germany.

Burns had used the Telegram messaging app to contact a representative of the British far-right group Patriotic Alternative.

Additionally, there were notes about German SS units serving in the Second World War, Adolf Hitler's book Mein Kampf and the nationalist novel The Turner Diaries.

At Bristol Crown Court on Friday, a judge imposed a custodial sentence on Burns of 15-and-a-half years with an additional four-year period on licence once she is released.

Serena Gates KC, prosecuting, told the court: "The prosecution case is that the defendant had an extreme right-wing mindset and wanted Jews and Muslims to be killed, and non-whites to flee or be expelled from the UK.

"The day before the attack, the defendant was watching videos of SS marches and sent an email called 'The dawn of civil war'."

At a previous hearing, Burns, of Lynton Road, Bristol, pleaded guilty to attempted murder and three charges of having an article with a blade or point - specifically an axe, a scalpel and two darts.

She had denied a charge of engaging in conduct in preparation of terrorist acts, contrary to the Terrorism Act.

The Crown argued that despite accepting the pleas, there remained a terrorist motivation to the attack, which the judge, Mrs Justice Lambert, accepted.

Passing sentence, the judge said: "I have no doubt that you are a dangerous offender and you remain deeply entrenched in your abnormal belief system."

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