Lorry driver who ran gun-conversion and explosives workshop from a caravan whereas making ready for ‘race battle’ is jailed for 16 years
An illegal arms and explosives manufacturer who was supplying criminal gangs as well as stockpiling weapons for a ‘race war’ has been jailed for 16 years.
Thomas McKenna secretly set up a workshop at Britain’s largest traveller camp where he converted blank-firing pistols and made hollow ‘dum dum’ bullets, which maximise damage to their target.
He also had a single-firing shotgun disguised as a torch and replicas of an AK47 and Sten Mark II sub-machine gun that he may have been planning to make live.
When armed police raided the Buckles Lane compound in South Ockendon, Essex, they also found improvised explosive devices, gunpowder and the ingredients to make more bombs.
Extremist right-wing material revealed that, in addition to selling the munitions for profit, McKenna, 60, was preparing for a war on ‘Muslims, the immigrants and so on’.
Hate-filled text messages to associates included: ‘Our only course for survival freedom is strike now while we have the numbers and hard unalive the f****** lot of them’.
McKenna, who officially worked as a lorry driver, was caught after police began investigating a tip-off about converted weapons being sold by Faisal Razzaq.
Razzaq was previously jailed for 11 years for his role as a getaway driver and lookout in the shocking murder of PC Sharon Beshenivsky, who was shot during a botched robbery at a Bradford travel agent in 2005.
Thomas McKenna, 60, who ran a clandestine gun and explosives factory from a caravan at a traveller camp has been jailed for 16 years
McKenna, who has previous firearms convictions, admitted 14 charges ranging from converting firearms, possession of firearms and ammunition, conspiracy to sell, attempting to make explosives and possessing terrorist material.
Judge Peter Lodder KC described him today as ‘dangerous’, adding: ‘I am satisfied you were stockpiling weapons, including under your own bed, and that you entered hate filled and incendiary communications.’
However, he added he accepted it was not for a ‘specific terrorist activity’.
Also sentenced today at Kingston Crown Court in south west London was McKenna’s girlfriend, Tina Smith, 55, and car salesman Allan Crosby and Ryan Smith, both 40.
Bus driver Tina Smith – who lived with McKenna at Buckles Lane and also texted foul anti-Muslim rants including ‘shoot them all’ – admitted possessing a prohibited firearm, making explosives and three terrorism offences.
Handing her a seven-year period behind bars, the judge said she was ‘in thrall’ to McKenna and showed ‘enthusiastic involvement’ in his offences.
Her role in helping to deliver weapons and obtaining parts in homemade bombs and her racist messages revealed a ‘poisonous and deeply unattractive character’.
Crosby and Ryan Smith, whose high-end car dealership, Sterling Sports and Prestige Ltd in Kent, were found with one of the converted pistols made by self-taught McKenna.
McKenna was ordered out of his caravan by armed police during a raid in November 2024
The lorry driver, who was stockpiling weapons for a ‘race war’ had been converting Turkish-made Ceonic P320 blank-firing pistols
Other weapons found included replica sub-machine guns that detectives believe would also have been altered to turn them into live weapons
Two improvised explosive devices – plus the material for dozens more – were recovered
Tina Smith, 54, who lived with McKenna, and shared his far-right beliefs, admitted possessing a prohibited firearm, making explosives and three terrorism offences
They were jailed for seven years and ten years respectively after they admitted firearms offences and Crosby pleaded guilty to a separate offence of possessing cocaine with intent to supply.
Judge Lodder added it was ‘wholly fortuitous and no credit to any of you that many of these weapons appear to have been recovered by police’ and said there was a ‘strong need for deterrence for offences of this nature’.
Seven other gang members, including Razzaq, 44, will be sentenced at Harrow Crown Court on February 26.
Detective Chief Inspector James Tipple, of the Met’s Specialist Crime Command, said busting the gang had led to ‘significant reductions in the numbers of converted blank firearms involved in shooting in London’.
He added: ‘It is extremely rare you take out an entire criminal network like this in one go.’
A total of six converted Turkish-made Ceonic P320 blank-firing pistols were recovered at the traveller camp, which has around 1,000 residents, and at other addresses in or around London. Another nine guns were ready for conversion.
The raid on November 6, 2024, which was overseen by the Metropolitan Police’s Counter Terrorism Command, SO15 and saw McKenna ordered out of one caravan at gunpoint, also led to the seizure of the sub-machine guns, as well as crossbows, knuckle dusters, hunting knives and handbooks on making DIY weapons and explosives.
Two improvised explosive devices (IEDs) made from plastic fish feeders and using a bullet as the explosive charge were kept in a jar by a bed. One contained seven rounds of ammunition and seven screws to function as shrapnel.
Buckles Lane in South Ockendon, Essex, has around 1,000 occupants
Self-taught McKenna had a workshop including a lathe and drills in one of his three caravans
More than 4kg of gunpowder was found, along with the material to make more
Paraphernalia found during the raid included handbooks on making potentially deadly DIY devices
Nearby was a tub with 4kg of gunpowder – also known as black powder – and ingredients to make more, including 1kg of potassium nitrate.
Checks on electronic devices revealed the vile messages to associates via TikTok, Facebook and Signal in which McKenna exhorted them to arm themselves for the race war and spoke of ‘kicking it off myself’.
One used a British military term for shooting and said: ‘I don’t understand why we’re not slotting them [Muslims]. I think this will happen this year.’
Others threatened ‘We have to fully dominate the Muslims or there will never be peace’ and ‘I have a bunch of s***. I’m stockpiling. Hit them on the approach. Ambush them.’
Hossein Zahir KC, representing McKenna during the two-day sentencing hearing, argued his client’s firearms offences were at the lower end of the scale as the guns were ‘not hard to convert’ and ‘unsophisticated’.
The manufacture of the black powder, he said, was for ‘experimental purposes’ and the manuals and videos McKenna possessed were ‘widely available on the internet’.
But Judge Peter Lodder KC, alluding to McKenna’s text messages in which he talked about ‘stockpiling’, noted: ‘The communications are not about “I’m going to have an experiment” are they?’
Mr Zahir added the texts were ‘fantasies’, saying: ‘He doesn’t desire such an outcome – but rather he believes it is an inevitability brought about by others.’
The police raid on Britain’s biggest traveller site at Buckles Lane in South Ockendon, Essex
Car salesman Ryan Smith was convicted of firearms offences
Allan Crosby, who also ran the car sales firm, was convicted of firearms offences and a separate offence of possessing cocaine with intent to supply
Charles Langley KC, for Tina Smith, said there was ‘insufficient’ evidence to show that she knew the gunpowder was being used in IEDs.
Judge Lodder told him: ‘I find it implausible that she did not know.’
A psychiatric report had identified her as being ‘dependent and compliant’ in her relationships owing to past trauma and was considered ‘vulnerable’. She has no previous convictions.
The National Crime Agency has warned that organised crime gangs are increasingly converting blank-firing pistols imported from Turkey into viable weapons.
