Nail Bomber is a 2021 Netflix series about the nail bomber that terrorized London in 1999.
10 out of 10 stars. Rarely do you see a series put together with the entire story start to finish including all the players, the heroes and the bad guys. Thank you, Arthur, for identifying this guy before he could maim or murder anyone else.
This series begins on May 1, 1999 with an interview with the actual nail bomber, David James Copeland, age 23. He was recruited into the British Nationalist Party (BNP) to be a Nazi and wanted to start a race war. He wanted to create as much carnage as possible. So he wrapped his bombs around a box of nails to maim and injure as many people as possible. One of his victims, a toddler, had a four inch nail embedded in his skull. I didn’t even know that England had an entire political party of Nazis. Imagine my surprise. :0
The first bombing, on Saturday, 17 April 1999, was on Electric Avenue, Brixton, an area of south London with a large black population. At 5:10 pm, it was busy and a bomb wrapped in a box of nails was left in a bag near a stall. At 5:29 pm a crackhead came and took the bomb out of the bag then stole the bag and walked away as the vendors watched. Seconds later, the bomb exploded. 48 people are injured including a child with a 4 inch nail embedded in his skull.
The intelligence agency (they don’t come out and call themselves MI6) for England puts together an operation called Searchlight that monitors fascist groups. In 1999, a kid named Arthur who is anti-racist joins the British Nationalist Party, a Nazi recruiting machine, to spy on them. He goes to the intelligence agency and volunteers to feed them information. But so far no one has claimed responsibility. Meanwhile the nail bomber says he will put out one nail bomb a week, so they have 7 days to catch him before he bombs again.
The second bomb, on the following Saturday, 24 April, was aimed at Brick Lane in the East End of London, which has a large Bangladeshi community. When the bomb goes off at 5:29 pm, 13 people are injured and maimed.
After the second bomb, the intelligence agency gives Arthur a brief description of the bomber form videos and posts this blurry image on all news media. He tells them they’re describing Dave from Barking, John Tyndall’s right hand man. Tyndall is the leader of the British Nationalist Party and incites them to violence. BNP members drive in vans round London, kidnap black people and torture them. This is also how lower members in the BNP get Tyndall’s recognition. The more violent they are, the more chance that they too can become Tyndall’s right hand man. David from Barking is David Copeland.
The third and final bomb went off on the evening of Friday, 30 April at The Admiral Duncan pub on Old Compton Street in Soho, the heart of London’s gay community. Copeland went into the pub at 5:50 pm, has a cola, then leaves. At 6:29 pm, the bomb explodes injuring 79 people and killing a pregnant woman and the best man from her wedding. Dave Copeland is arrested in Cove, Hampshire.
Thirteen months later is David Copeland’s murder trial. He uses the insanity plea and tries to convince psychologists that he is insane. But a bouncer from Essex named Bernie has been writing to Copeland pretending to be a cute blonde girl named Patsy and Copeland writes to Patsy that he’s fooled the shrinks into thinking he’s insane. That letter is used against Copeland in court. He gets six life sentences.
Over the years, Arthur helps the intelligence agency stop most of John Tyndall’s rampages of hate in which he incites BNP members to make other attacks on minorities. Now that’s heartwarming.
10 out of 10 stars. Simple. Straightforward. Heartwrenching. Heartwarming. Thanks Arthur and thanks Bernie.
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