Tommy Robinson has admitted he wanted to “put pressure” on Daily Mail journalists who published a story about him while he was on a family holiday, but insisted he did not mean to “intimidate them” by having private investigators take photos of their homes.
Robinson told a jury he would “not endanger any innocent family” and that he was “panicked and terrified” after the Daily Mail, and its sister publication the MailOnline, published a story about posts he made on social media during the Southport riots while on holiday in Cyprus.
The 43-year-old, who gave his full name to the court as “Stephen Lennon” when he was called to the witness box on Thursday, said he was “shocked and scared” after the newspaper published the story about him in August 2024.
He said he wanted to track down the journalists who wrote the Mail Online story about him to “question them on camera” but did not want to cause any harm to their families.
The defendant said he hired private investigators to find the home addresses of freelance journalist Andrew Young and editor Jacob Dirnhuber and take photographs.
He said: “I wanted the find the journalists,” adding he wanted to “put pressure on them”.
Robinson denied that having the private investigators take photographs of their houses was “designed to intimidate them”.
During his evidence at Southwark Crown Court, Robinson said he became aware of the story, which had the headline “Stoking riots from his sunbed”, after it had gone online and his phone “started going crazy with people messaging me”.
Robinson told the court that the Daily Mail journalists “know I’m not going to come and beat them up”.
He told the court: “They know I’m not going to come and beat them up. They know that.”
Holt said: “They are scared of you, Mr Lennon.”
Robinson replied: “They are not scared of physical violence from me.”
He added that the journalists were instead scared of “humiliation” from him questioning them.
Robinson said he believed he was “restrained” in a voicemail he left for Daily Mail editor-in-chief Ted Verity when he said he would make him and his family famous.
Looking at a transcript of the voicemail, he told the court: “I read this and think I’m very restrained in conversation with this gentleman.”
He said he told the journalists he would get their addresses because he was “using it as a play card”.
Holt responded: “The play card you are using is putting them in fear, isn’t it?”
Robinson rejected Holt’s claim, saying of the Daily Mail’s actions: “It’s not justifiable what they have done.”
Robinson struggled to answer a question about how his children were affected by the story as he took tissues from a nearby tissue box and wiped tears from his eyes.
He replied that he left the hotel after the story was published, and that his family moved to a different location within the hotel after he spoke with security.
Under cross examination from prosecutor Ben Holt, he was asked if there was “any need at all” to post pictures of the Daily Mail journalists’ home addresses on X.
He replied: “As I said at the time, I was desperate and I didn’t publish their addresses or their images.
“It was an attempt to bring the Daily Mail to the table.”
Robinson said his world was “collapsing” at the time article was published because they had taken a photograph of his ex-wife.
The defendant told the court he thought it was “totally reasonable… under the circumstances” to post a picture of Dirnhuber outside his home on X, saying he wanted to “put pressure on him”.
Asked by defence barrister Alisdair Williamson KC if he wanted to expose Dirnhuber to threats of violence, he said: “Not at all. I didn’t really think about what he was being exposed to.”
The defendant told the jury he wanted to question the Daily Mail about “the wrongness of what they had done” when he called Young on 5 August, in a conversation his alleged victim described as “menacing”.
“I just wanted them to acknowledge – is it OK? If I was to do this to you, would that be OK?” he said.
Robinson said “within hours” of the story going online, people were posting the name of the hotel he was staying at in Cyprus, with those publishing the hotel name “telling people to head there” and that “this is where I am for the foreseeable future”.
He agreed when Williamson said that in the immediate aftermath of the murders of three girls in Southport he had made a “rather intemperate statement” but subsequently issued “calls for calm”.
Robinson told the jury: “Anyone following what I was saying would have seen I was trying to calm the situation the whole time.”
He said he had tagged Elon Musk in one of his posts on X about the Daily Mail article because there were guidelines against posting addresses on the platform, and he was hoping to get the article removed.
Asked about his state of mind, Robinson said: “Panicked, totally panicked. Panicked and terrified that what was online currently was about to change my wife’s life forever.”
Criticising the newspaper’s story, the defendant told the jury: “I would not endanger any innocent family.
“They could have run the story without giving my location. They shouldn’t have done that and this is not journalism, this is endangering us.”
He added: “I would find the men on camera and ask them how was I stoking race riots?
“They put the story out there and it’s everywhere and all of a sudden, it’s matter of fact.
“The main question I wanted to ask is: is it OK what you have done?”
“You are bullying them in front of millions of X users,” Holt said.
Robinson replied: “No, quite the opposite actually.”
“Again, in the circumstances, at that moment I was quite desperate,” Robinson later said.
Robinson said he did not see a reply to one of his X posts which gave the email address of Dirnhuber, leading to the journalist receiving threatening messages.
Holt asked Robinson if, had he seen the reply, he would have asked the X user to take it down.
Robinson replied: “Again, this is all started by them (the journalists).”
Commenting on the content of the emails Dirnhuber received, he added: “I don’t think it’s right. They’re extremely wrong.”
He also said: “I have not encouraged anyone to do anything like this, it was quite the opposite.”
Holt asked Robinson about Dirnhuber having to leave his home, along with his partner and dog, for a week as a result of threatening emails he allegedly received.
Holt then told Robinson: “You know that Mr Young didn’t do that because of his family arrangements.”
Andrew Young and his wife had their oldest daughter, grandson and two dogs at their home address at the time, and had decided against leaving for this reason.
Robinson replied: “The entire situation, I wish didn’t happen, I wish that none of that had happened. I was unfortunately in a situation where I was panicked.”
The defendant, who founded the English Defence League, entered not guilty pleas to two charges of harassment causing fear of violence in July last year.
The trial continues.
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