Man who attacked UK asylum hotel jailed for 9 years

LONDON,:

A man who attacked a hotel housing asylum seekers during an August riot in northern England was Thursday jailed for nine years, the highest sentence for this summer's anti-immigration riots.

Levi Fishlock, 31, pleaded guilty to violent disorder and arson with intent to endanger life, in what the judge described as "one of the worst" cases related to the riot in Rotherham.

Hundreds had gathered outside the hotel for asylum seekers, attacking the building and police officers.

The violence came amid a wave of anti-immigrant and Islamophobic riots that shook England and Wales earlier this year.

Fishlock smashed windows and helped set fire to a wheelie bin used to block an exit of a Holiday Inn housing some 200 asylum seekers.

He was also part of a group shouting racist slurs, made threatening signs with a sharp object to asylum seekers sheltering in the hotel, and threw rocks at approaching police cars.

He was "intending to endanger the lives of many people trapped in the hotel", said judge Jeremy Richardson.

Handing down the nine-year sentence at a court in Sheffield, the judge said Fishlock "played a part in almost every aspect of the racist mob violence on that terrible day in August".