LONDON — The founder of the far-right English Defense League was sentenced to a year and a half in prison on Monday for violating a court order banning him from repeating defamatory allegations against a Syrian refugee.

Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, better known as Tommy Robinson, admitted contempt of court at Woolwich Crown Court for breaching a 2021 injunction by giving interviews in a podcast shown on YouTube and in a documentary he presented during a rally in London did. This post in Trafalgar Square in July was also shared on his account on social media platform X and was widely viewed.

Judge Jeremy Johnson said Robinson’s breach of the injunction was not “accidental, negligent or simply reckless” but a “planned, deliberate, direct and flagrant breach of the court’s orders”.

“The defendant has shown no remorse for breaching the order. It would be surprising if he had done so,” Johnson said. “All of his actions so far show that he considers himself above the law.”

Robinson, 41, who has been jailed in the past for assault, mortgage fraud and contempt of court, founded the nationalist street protest group EDL in 2009 in response to radical Islamic preacher Anjem Choudary. Even after the group faded away in 2013, he remained one of the most influential far-right figures in Britain and can still draw large crowds to the streets.

This summer, police blamed the EDL for starting what turned into a week of rioting across England and Northern Ireland after social media users incorrectly identified the suspect in a stabbing attack that killed three teenage girls in the seaside area of ​​Southport as an immigrant and Muslim.

Robinson, who was out of the country at the time of the attack, was accused of using his social media presence to incite unrest. Although he was banned from Twitter in 2018, he was allowed back after Elon Musk took over the social network and now has 1 million followers on the platform known as X.

Thousands of people gathered in central London on Saturday to support Robinson at a UK rally he had planned but was unable to attend because he was jailed ahead of his trial.

Robinson was jailed on Friday on a warrant issued after he failed to attend a contempt hearing in July and left the country for Cyprus.

He was ordered not to repeat false claims made in 2018 by a teenager called Jamal Hijazi that he was a violent thug who bullied and threatened other pupils at a school in West Yorkshire, northern England.

The videos Robinson prepared about Hicazi were watched more than 1 million times and led to harassment against the child. He dropped out of school and his family had to leave their home.

Hijazi sued Robinson for libel in the High Court of London and was awarded $130,000 in damages and court costs. An injunction was granted preventing Robinson from repeating the allegations.

Robinson has violated the injunction 10 times since 2023; The most important of these was the release of his documentary about the case called “Silenced”, which has been watched more than 44 million times.

Defense lawyer Sasha Wass insisted Robinson was a journalist who believed in free speech and stood behind the documentary produced by Alex Jones, the US conspiracy theorist who founded Infowars.

Solicitor Aidan Eardley, for the Attorney General, said failure to comply with the court order created a risk of others not complying with the court order.

Far-right activist Tommy Robinson, alias of Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, 35, outside Folkestone Police Station in England, Friday, October 25, 2024. (Yui Mok/PA via AP)

FILE – British far-right activist Tommy Robinson speaks during a rally in Parliament Square following the final leg of the “Leave March” in London on Friday, March 29, 2019. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein, File)