'Cult' members who 'wanted to construct own legal system' jailed for coroner kidnap plot

Four 'cult' members have been jailed for plotting to kidnap and falsely imprison a coroner.

Mark Christopher, 59, and Matthew Martin, 47, both from east London, along with married couple Shiza Harper, 45, and Sean Harper, 38, both from South Benfleet, Essex, were convicted in July.

During their trial, Chelmsford Crown Court heard that Lincoln Brookes, senior coroner for Essex, received a series of "very bizarre" letters between March and September 2022, followed by emails stating that "corporal punishment may be administered".

Mr Brookes described the messages, which claimed to be warrants "for seizure of goods and persons", as "troubling" and "upsetting". In one, he said he was accused of "detrimental necromancy".

He referred the letters to Essex County Council's fraud detection department.

The judge Mr Justice Goss said Mr Brookes was told it was "not a known scam and it was decided to keep an eye on it".

In March 2023, Christopher sent "further malicious communications" to Mr Brookes.

The judge said that Christopher also hosted an online rally on 17 April 2023 where he "foreshadowed the closing of the coroner's court and the Southend County Court and the administration of corporal punishment if need be".

Mr Justice Goss continued: "You told those attending to remember that they were doing this because their country is going to be overtaken by Nazis."

He added that Christopher warned that the "Nazis" would "kick your door down and mutilate your children for surgery" and those attending therefore had to "whack them to death".

"The clip ended with you saying you were going to shut down the coroner's court, administering corporal punishment if need be," the judge said.

He told the four defendants that they "all attended that rally".

Three days later the defendants travelled to the coroner's court in Chelmsford with handcuffs in search of Mr Brookes, but he was not there at the time, Chelmsford Crown Court heard.

The defendants had entered a room where another coroner, Michelle Brown, was conducting documentary inquests, before demanding to know where Mr Brookes was and said they were shutting down the court.

She said that the leader, Christopher, "kept demanding that I find and get Mr Brookes".

Judge calls Christopher 'manipulative'

During summing up in the case, Mr Justice Goss told jurors that the defendants were "members of a group called the Federal Postal Court, or Court of the People".

He added on the day of the attempted kidnap, the four defendants had driven to the court in two vehicles "displaying the emblem of your organisation".

In sentencing remarks, the judge described Christopher as "manipulative and dishonest". He said Christopher was the "self-appointed leader" with the title "chief judge of England and all dominions".

He added Martin was a "sheriff and a coroner", Sean Harper a "sheriff" and his wife Shiza Harper a "postal inspector and auditor".

All three had been "qualified" by Christopher, the court heard.

Coroner 'regularly has nightmares about incident'

In a victim impact statement read out in court, Mr Brookes said on Monday: "I regularly have nightmares about the incident and the suspects attending my home."

Mr Brookes said he has had "initial trauma therapy" and is now "hyper vigilant about the safety of my family and myself".

He said he had been driving to the court, having accompanied a family member to a hospital appointment that morning, when he received a call about what had happened and he turned around.

Mr Brookes said he was warned not to come to the building and was told "these are the people from the letter - they're coming to get you".

He said he suffers "flashbacks of the journey home" and at the time "was wondering if the cars around me were following me or trying to beat me to my house".

Detective Chief Inspector Nathan Hutchinson from Essex Police said: "The ideologies of this group were concerning and they genuinely believed that they had the power to construct their own legal system, threaten others and were above English law."

He praised staff at the coroner's court for acting "calmly and rationally during an intimidating and traumatising ordeal".

In July this year, Martin told Chelmsford Crown Court he was a "man of honour".

He said: "What I do for a living, what I do every day when I wake up, I deal with state child trafficking."

He added that it was "nothing to do with terrorism or cult, it's strictly facts".

Christopher, of Forest Gate, east London, Martin, of Plaistow, east London, Shiza Harper and Sean Harper, both of South Benfleet, Essex, all denied conspiracy to kidnap and conspiracy to commit false imprisonment, but were all found guilty on both counts following a two-week trial.

Christopher, who was also found guilty of sending threatening letters to Mr Brookes, with intent to cause distress or anxiety, was sentenced to seven years for the conspiracy to kidnap and 18 months for malicious intent, to run concurrently.

The judge said Christopher "lay at the very heart of these offences".

He said the other three defendants "were prepared to commit offences while doing his bidding", and jailed them for 30 months each.

All four were also ordered each to pay a £228 surcharge and subjected each to a restraining order, barring them from entering any courthouse in England and Wales without a prior appointment and blocking them from contacting Mr Brookes or Ms Brown.

(c) Sky News 2024: 'Cult' members who 'wanted to construct own legal system' jailed for coroner kidnap plot