VERDICT: MISLEADING AND, IN KEY PLACES, UNSUPPORTEDFact Check: Katie Hopkins Claims the Government Is Jailing Anti-Migrant Protesters While Releasing Murderers and Rapists

VERDICT: MISLEADING AND, IN KEY PLACES, UNSUPPORTED

Katie Hopkins presents an extraordinary picture of the British justice system.

According to Hopkins, anti-migration activist Danny Tommo was rapidly hauled before a specially arranged court, a government lawyer or magistrate was brought in, the people involved were “doing the bidding of Shabana Mahmood”, and Tommo was denied bail while murderers and rapists are supposedly being released because Britain’s prisons are full.

She then says Del Somerville was jailed for two years essentially because he “throws a plastic bottle and swears a bit”.

There are genuine facts underneath this story.

Britain really does have a serious prison-capacity problem.

Danny Tommo really has been remanded in custody.

Del Somerville really was sentenced to two years.

And Somerville’s judge really did say that deterrence was part of the purpose of his sentence.

But Hopkins repeatedly removes facts that materially change the story — and then makes allegations of government interference for which she provides no evidence.

CLAIM 1: DANNY TOMMO WAS JUST A MAN WHO “GOT IN THE WATER TO STOP THE BOATS”

Hopkins says:

“Danny always said, When are we actually going to stand up and do something? And that’s why he did something. He went in the water to physically stop the boats.”

That is an extraordinarily sanitised description of the allegation before the court.

Daniel Thomas, known as Danny Tommo, has been charged with criminal damage after allegedly using a knife to slash an inflatable boat in the English Channel.

There was an emergency responder aboard the boat.

Thomas has pleaded NOT GUILTY.

That distinction is essential. He has not been convicted and is entitled to the presumption of innocence.

But the allegation he is defending is considerably more serious than merely getting into the water to protest immigration.

He is also separately charged with failing to disclose the PIN to his phone under section 53 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000. He has pleaded not guilty to that charge as well.

So the relevant question for the court isn’t whether somebody is allowed to oppose small-boat immigration.

It is whether Thomas committed the criminal offences alleged.

CLAIM 2: HIS CASE WAS SOMEHOW HEARD SUSPICIOUSLY QUICKLY

Hopkins says:

“some people waiting up to six years to have their cases heard. Danny Tomo’s case is heard within, what, 24 hours.”

This comparison confuses two completely different stages of the criminal justice process.

Thomas wasn’t arrested, tried and convicted within 24 hours.

He was charged and brought before a magistrates’ court for an initial hearing.

His case is continuing.

Indeed, Thomas elected Crown Court trial and his case was sent to Portsmouth Crown Court.

Britain’s Crown Court backlog is unquestionably serious.

Official Ministry of Justice statistics published in September 2026 show that defendants who pleaded not guilty and ultimately had a jury trial had a median wait of 49.7 weeks.

For defendants remanded in custody after pleading not guilty, the median wait was 28 weeks.

Those delays are substantial.

But comparing those waits for trials with the speed at which a newly charged defendant first appears before magistrates is comparing different things.

Thomas has not somehow jumped from arrest to completed trial in a day.

CLAIM 3: A “SPECIAL GOVERNMENT LAWYER” OR MAGISTRATE WAS SENT DOWN

Hopkins says:

“A special government lawyer brought down, or magistrate to oversee the case.”

Notice the uncertainty in her own sentence.

Was it a lawyer?

Or a magistrate?

Hopkins doesn’t appear to know.

The magistrate was Deputy Senior District Judge Tan Ikram, the deputy chief magistrate.

Thomas was represented by Simon Pentol KC.

The Crown was represented by a prosecutor.

That is a court hearing, not evidence of a government conspiracy.

If Hopkins has evidence that somebody was specially dispatched by the government for political reasons, she doesn’t present it.

CLAIM 4: “YOU KNOW” THEY WERE DOING SHABANA MAHMOOD’S BIDDING

Hopkins then makes a much more serious allegation:

“So you know that they’re just doing the bidding of Shabana Mahmood.”

No.

We don’t know that.

And Hopkins provides no evidence establishing it.

A judge refusing bail to a political activist does not demonstrate that a government minister secretly ordered the result.

The reported explanation from the bench was quite different.

Deputy Senior District Judge Tan Ikram said:

“I am satisfied there is a real possibility of an immediate custodial sentence in this case.”

People are perfectly entitled to disagree with the bail decision.

But disagreement with a judicial decision is not evidence that the judge was taking orders from a politician.

That would be an extremely serious allegation of political interference with an independent court.

It requires extremely serious evidence.

Hopkins provides none.

CLAIM 5: DEL SOMERVILLE GOT TWO YEARS FOR “THROWING A PLASTIC BOTTLE”

Hopkins says:

“another lovely gentleman, Del Somerville, who throws a plastic bottle and swears a bit”

and:

“he’s locked up for two years for throwing a plastic bottle.”

This is perhaps the best example of how a technically true detail can create a thoroughly misleading description.

Yes, Somerville threw a plastic bottle.

Yes, he swore at police.

Yes, he received a two-year prison sentence.

But what offence did he actually plead guilty to?

VIOLENT DISORDER.

Somerville pleaded guilty at Portsmouth Crown Court to violent disorder arising from the anti-migration protest at Eastney Marina on 6 September.

Prosecutors described him as an active participant who demonstrated hostile and aggressive behaviour towards police.

The bottle was part of the evidence of that conduct.

It was not the name of the offence for which the judge sentenced him.

Calling this “two years for throwing a plastic bottle” is rather like describing a robbery conviction as “prison for asking somebody for their wallet”.

It removes the legal offence and leaves viewers with the least serious physical action involved.

WAS THE SENTENCE HARSH?

That is a legitimate question.

Somerville’s supporters are perfectly entitled to argue that two years was excessive.

His personal circumstances, including being a father, are relevant mitigation.

People can compare his sentence with sentences imposed in other genuinely comparable violent-disorder cases.

But that is a different argument.

A proper comparison would require comparing:

the offences;

the defendant’s role;

criminal history;

aggravating and mitigating circumstances;

guilty plea;

injuries;

risk;

and the relevant sentencing guideline.

Simply finding somebody convicted of an apparently worse crime who received a different sentence does not by itself establish political discrimination.

CLAIM 6: THE JUDGE WANTED TO DETER OTHER PROTESTERS

Here Hopkins has a point.

She says:

“it’s said that his case is a deterrent to others.”

That is substantially correct.

Judge Daniel Sawyer explicitly said Somerville’s sentence should act as a deterrent following subsequent protests.

That is worth reporting.

But deterrence is not evidence that Somerville was convicted of holding an anti-immigration opinion.

He pleaded guilty to violent disorder.

Whether two years was proportionate remains something people can debate.

CLAIM 7: RAPISTS ARE BEING RELEASED BECAUSE THE PRISONS ARE FULL

Hopkins says:

“rapists are being let out, murderers are being let out, people who’ve committed horrendous crimes and caused actual bodily harm to people are being let out, released, because there’s no space”

There really is a prison-capacity crisis.

The government itself says its sentencing reforms are intended partly to ensure sufficient prison capacity.

But the specific comparison Hopkins makes with rape and murder is badly misleading.

The government’s new Sentencing Act 2026 Progression Model explicitly excludes rape.

It also excludes serious child sexual offences, grooming offences, indecent assault and offences relating to unlawful killing.

And more than 18,000 prisoners serving more serious sentence types — including life and extended determinate sentences — aren’t eligible for Progression in the first place.

Murder carries a mandatory life sentence.

So murderers serving life sentences aren’t simply being pushed through this new Progression Model to free up cells for anti-immigration protesters.

That doesn’t mean a person convicted of rape or murder can never leave prison.

Life prisoners can ultimately be released on licence where the law permits and the relevant release test is satisfied.

Nor does it mean every violent offender is excluded from the new arrangements.

But that is quite different from Hopkins’s rhetorical picture:

prisons are supposedly too full for murderers and rapists, but mysteriously have plenty of room for people who oppose immigration.

The government’s published rules expressly exclude rape, unlawful killing and life sentences from the new Progression arrangements.

CLAIM 8: “ANTIFA” AND “FREE PALESTINE” PROTESTERS BATTER POLICE AND “NOTHING HAPPENS”

Hopkins says:

“everyone’s seen the footage of all these others, Antifa, Free Palestine, everyone else, battering police, but nothing happens to them, just this one guy.”

Which people?

Which protests?

Which assaults?

Which defendants?

Which charging decisions?

Which sentences?

Hopkins provides none.

A serious allegation of politically selective justice needs comparable cases.

You cannot establish “two-tier justice” simply by referring to unspecified footage of unspecified people at unspecified demonstrations and asserting that “nothing happens to them”.

If comparable cases exist, identify them.

Then compare them.

Until then, this is an assertion, not evidence.

CLAIM 9: THE GOVERNMENT SENT SOMEONE FROM LONDON WITH “EXPRESS ORDERS”

Later Hopkins goes even further:

“you’ll send your guy down from London, who’s been given express orders as to what to do to people”

This has now moved beyond criticism of a bail decision.

Hopkins appears to be alleging direct political manipulation of criminal proceedings.

Who was “your guy”?

Who gave the “express orders”?

What were those orders?

Where is the evidence?

No evidence is provided.

The public record instead shows a defendant represented by counsel, a prosecutor, and a senior district judge giving a stated judicial reason for remanding him.

Calling that the execution of secret government orders requires evidence that Hopkins simply doesn’t produce.

CLAIM 10: HOPKINS HERSELF WAS TARGETED FOR HER 2015 “STOP THE BOATS” COLUMN

Here the underlying story is real.

In April 2015 Hopkins wrote a Sun column in which she described migrants as “cockroaches” and “feral humans” and advocated using gunships to stop migrant boats.

The column caused enormous controversy.

Police subsequently investigated allegations of inciting racial hatred.

Hopkins says:

“I was interviewed under caution eleven years ago”

Correct.

On 30 July 2015 she attended a central London police station by appointment and was interviewed under caution.

But there is another important fact.

The Metropolitan Police explicitly said:

“She was not arrested.”

She was not subsequently convicted or sentenced over the article.

So there is a legitimate free-speech discussion to be had about whether the police investigation itself was appropriate.

But Hopkins’s suggestion that authorities were trying “to get me some kind of sentence” goes beyond what the facts establish.

Police investigate.

Prosecutors decide whether prosecution is justified.

Courts determine guilt.

Judges sentence convicted defendants.

In Hopkins’s case, the process never reached prosecution, conviction or sentence.

CLAIM 11: THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, CHIEF RABBI, GOVERNMENT AND NGOs ARE INVOLVED

Then the argument becomes extraordinarily broad.

Hopkins says the real issue involves:

“the behaviour of the Catholic Church”

“the behaviour of the Chief Rabbi”

“government-level individuals”

and:

“well-financed NGOs”

She follows this with:

“the movement of human flesh has always been one of the most profitable businesses on the face of the planet.”

This sounds enormously significant.

But where is the factual allegation?

Which Catholic organisation?

What did it do?

What did the Chief Rabbi do?

Which government officials?

Which NGOs?

What money changed hands?

Who received it?

How much?

What evidence connects those people with a profitable scheme to move migrants?

None of that is supplied.

It is impossible to substantiate an enormous conspiracy merely by listing powerful institutions and then referring ominously to the profitable “movement of human flesh”.

Specific allegations require specific evidence.

“MINISTRY OF TRUTH”

Hopkins also says:

“now we’re told there’s going to be a Ministry of Truth.”

There is no literal British government department called the “Ministry of Truth”.

That expression comes from George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four and is commonly used rhetorically by critics of government measures concerning misinformation or online speech.

If Hopkins is referring to a particular proposed government body or policy, it should be identified and judged on what it actually does.

Calling something a “Ministry of Truth” doesn’t tell viewers what the policy is.

THE BIGGER PROBLEM WITH THE VIDEO

The recurring technique is remarkably consistent.

Start with something real:

Danny Tommo was remanded.

Then remove crucial context:

he is accused of slashing a boat with an emergency responder aboard.

Add an unsupported inference:

the court must therefore be doing Shabana Mahmood’s bidding.

Then turn the inference into apparent fact:

someone has supposedly been sent from London with “express orders”.

Do it again:

Del Somerville threw a plastic bottle.

Remove the actual conviction:

violent disorder.

Describe the sentence as:

two years for throwing a plastic bottle.

Then contrast it with:

“murderers” and “rapists” supposedly being released because prisons are full.

Leave out:

rape and unlawful killing are specifically excluded from the government’s new Progression Model, as are life sentences.

The underlying events are real.

The narrative constructed from them is something quite different.

VERDICT

MISLEADING AND, IN KEY PLACES, UNSUPPORTED.

Danny Tommo has been remanded in custody.

He has also pleaded not guilty and is entitled to a fair trial.

But he isn’t simply accused of standing in the Channel protesting immigration. He is accused of criminal damage after allegedly slashing a boat with an emergency responder aboard.

Del Somerville really did throw a plastic bottle and really did receive two years.

But he pleaded guilty to violent disorder.

The judge really did invoke deterrence.

But that doesn’t establish that Somerville was imprisoned for his political beliefs.

Britain really does have overcrowded prisons.

But the government’s new Progression Model specifically excludes rape, unlawful killing and serious sexual offences, while life prisoners are outside the scheme.

Hopkins really was questioned by police over her notorious 2015 migrant column.

But she wasn’t arrested, prosecuted or sentenced.

And most importantly, we found no evidence supporting the most explosive allegation in the video:

that Shabana Mahmood or the government sent somebody to court with “express orders” about what should happen to Danny Tommo.

Criticising a court decision is legitimate.

Alleging that a British court is secretly taking political orders from a government minister is something else entirely.

That requires evidence.

Hopkins provides none.

SOURCES

Danny Tommo court proceedings — Sky News:
https://news.sky.com/story/anti-migrant-activist-danny-tommo-pleads-not-guilty-to-criminal-damage-over-boat-slashing-13591663

Danny Tommo charges — ITV News:
https://www.itv.com/news/meridian/2026-09-25/daniel-thomas-to-appear-in-court-charged-over-alleged-channel-boat-slashing

Del Somerville sentencing — ITV News:
https://www.itv.com/news/meridian/2026-09-24/man-jailed-after-throwing-a-plastic-bottle-and-swearing-at-police

Del Somerville guilty plea — ITV News:
https://www.itv.com/news/meridian/2026-09-16/first-arrested-over-anti-migrant-protest-in-portsmouth-admits-violent-disorder

Ministry of Justice — Sentencing Act 2026 offence exclusions:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/sentencing-act-offence-exclusions

Ministry of Justice — Progression Model:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/a-guide-for-victims-about-the-changes-to-prison-release-arrangements/progression-model-changes-to-prison-release-arrangements

Ministry of Justice — criminal court waiting times:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/criminal-court-statistics-quarterly-april-to-june-2026/criminal-court-statistics-quarterly-april-to-june-2026

Katie Hopkins’s 2015 migrant column — ITV News:
https://www.itv.com/news/2015-04-18/katie-hopkins-compares-migrants-to-cockroaches-and-suggests-using-gunships-to-stop-them-crossing-the-mediterranean

Katie Hopkins’s 2015 police interview — The Independent:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/katie-hopkins-questioned-by-police-over-allegations-of-inciting-racial-hatred-after-migrants-article-10438481.html