Hateland

Only a month after his arrest for planting bombs which killed three and mutilated scores, Nazi nailbomber David Copeland began a passionate correspondence with a delightful young English rose called Patsy. As he awaited trial, Copeland bombarded Patsy with letters detailing his disturbed background, crackpot beliefs, and most intimate feelings. But Copeland wasn't writing to a petite 20-year-old blonde, but in fact a burly 40-year-old nightclub bouncer named Bernard O'Mahoney, who in the past had used the same means to coax confessions from two child-killers. O'Mahoney's earlier hoaxes helped secure life sentences, and so too did his correspondence with Copeland when the letters surfaced at the nailbomber's Old Bailey trial. But the remarkable story of how O'Mahoney snared Copeland is only a small part of *Hateland's* larger, more remarkable story. For the book is primarily the narrative of O'Mahoney's own gradual transition from Nazi thug to Nazi opponent. It marks his public renunciation of the hate-filled world he left behind.