A judge who sits on Jersey’s Court of Appeal has been appointed to review the UK’s anti-extremism scheme after it emerged that the man who murdered three young girls in Southport last year had been previously referred.
Lord David Anderson has been appointed as the new independent commissioner for the Prevent programme, which aims to divert people away from radicalisation.
The announcement came just one day after Axel Rudakubana pleaded guilty to murdering Alice da Silva Aguiar (9), Bebe King (6) and Elsie Dot Stancombe (7) in a knife attack at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Southport.
Rudakubana also admitted ten charges of attempted murder relating to the attack in July last year, alongside producing the deadly poison ricin and possessing an al Qaeda training manual.
The 18-year-old was sentenced to 52 years for the murder of the three girls on Thursday.
Shortly after his guilty plea, it emerged that Rudakubana had been referred to the Government anti-extremism scheme Prevent three times before the attack took place.
Lord Anderson will now conduct a review of the scheme, and identify changes needed to ensure serious cases such as those of Rudakubana are not missed.
Lord Anderson is also one of 12 judges for Jersey’s Court of Appeal, having been appointed by Queen Elizabeth II in 2015.
The crossbench peer, who practises from Brick Court Chambers in London, served as the UK’s independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, writing reports which helped shape the UK’s Investigatory Powers Act, launched in 2016.
Subsequent reports written by Lord Anderson concerned improvements to intelligence-handling after the 2017 attacks in Manchester and London, and in 2018 he was knighted for services to national security and civil liberties.
