A Royal Marine has pleaded guilty to preparing for a terrorist attack by stashing explosives in purpose-built caches in England and Northern Ireland.

Ciaran Maxwell, 31, of Exminster, was arrested over the discovery of a terrorist arsenal in Northern Ireland in August last year. He pleaded guilty to terrorist acts between January 2011 and August 2016.

According to the charge details, he had a stash of explosives in purpose-built hides in England and Northern Ireland. He compiled a library of terrorism documents, including instructions on how to make explosives, and tactics used by terrorist organisations.

He also had maps, plans and lists of potential targets for a terrorist attack and images of an adapted Police Service of Northern Ireland pass card and a PSNI uniform.

He bought chemicals and components and used them to manufacture explosives and devices, the court heard. Maxwell was also charged with possessing images of bank cards for fraud and possessing cannabis with intent to supply.

He appeared on Friday before Mr Justice Sweeney at the Old Bailey via video link from Woodhill jail and spoke only to confirm his name and enter guilty pleas to all the charges.



Maxwell was arrested on 24 August by officers from the Metropolitan police counter-terrorism command, supported by the Avon and Somerset, and Devon and Cornwall police forces. He was remanded in custody to be sentenced on a date to be fixed.

Maxwell, who grew up in the predominantly Protestant unionist town of Larne, used the cover of being a British marine to aid Irish republican dissidents opposed to peace and power-sharing in Northern Ireland.

In 2002, aged 16, Maxwell sustained serious injuries in a vicious sectarian attack carried out by young Larne loyalists. He was beaten with iron bars and golf clubs resulting in a fractured skull and severe bruising to his body.

He later recounted his ordeal to Sinn Féin’s weekly newspaper an Phoblacht (the Republican) in an article that was accompanied by a picture showing the extent of his injuries.

According to the paper, witnesses said that up to 10 loyalists appeared to have been waiting in ambush and kept beating him “as he lay prone on the ground”.

Despite the assault and his decision to publicise the attack in the Sinn Féin paper, Maxwell took a career path Irish republicans would see as treacherous: he joined the British military.

For the last six years he served as a Royal Marine commando, including undertaking a tour of duty in Afghanistan.

A father of one and a sports enthusiast, Maxwell attended the Catholic secondary school in Larne, St Comgall’s, and won trophies and medals there in track and field events.

One close family friend described him to the Guardian as a “straightforward young man who had his head screwed on”. The same friend said he was astonished to learn that Maxwell was arrested last year in connection with two significant arms finds in forests outside Larne.

Last May, the then home secretary, Theresa May, announced that the threat level to Britain from groups such as the New IRA and Continuity IRA was at its most severe in years. The statement came in between two major security operations that uncovered an array of terrorist weapons in Carnfunnock and Capanagh parks within months of each other.

An armour-piercing improvised rocket and two military anti-personnel mines were among the cache recovered at Capanagh in May. Several pipe bombs, magazines and ammunition for an assault rifle as well as bomb component parts and command wires were also concealed in barrels in purpose-built holes in woodland.

Three months earlier, bomb-making items were found at nearby Carnfunnock country park. The PSNI said at the time that four barrels were unearthed at Carnfunnock – two were empty but two contained a variety of bomb-making components, including wiring, toggle switches, circuit boards, partially constructed timer power units, ball bearings and a small quantity of explosives.

At the same time the Met’s counter-terrorist command unit and police in Somerset raided a military base and searches were carried out in forests nearby. Maxwell was arrested and then charged on suspicion of preparing acts of terrorism.

The official line from the PSNI in relation to the two arms finds near Larne was that one of them came about when a jogger spotted barely concealed holes in the forest floor.

Security sources, however, believe MI5, which has prime responsibility for counter-terrorist operations in Northern Ireland, had been tracking Maxwell as he secreted the weaponry, including the military grade Claymore anti-personnel mines, in wooded areas where no one would suspect republican dissidents of operating.

The operation to capture the two arsenals believed to have belonged to the New IRA included tracing two Claymore mines to a military base in England from which it was believed they were stolen.

The discovery of both arms hauls dealt a major blow to the republican dissidents as the weapons would have been used either to kill members of the security forces in Northern Ireland or possibly attack strategic targets in England.

• This article was amended on 7 February 2017 to clarify that the Royal Marines are not part of the British army.