'Patriots' rally Man shouted 'Heil Hitler' at Jewish men

SELF-PROCLAIMED neo-Nazi shouted ‘Heil Hitler’ three times over the shoulders of a line of police protecting him, after he identified two Jewish men in a counter-protest during the ‘Bristol Patriots’ march through the city centre on Saturday.

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The man caught on video footage seen by the Post is Ryan Ferguson, a prominent far right protester, who travelled for the day to Bristol from the north west to join the ‘Bristol Patriots’ event, which was called ‘United Against Extremism’.

Ferguson, who was jailed last year for making false 999 calls, was a prominent figure at the front of the ‘Bristol Patriots’ march, as it was given a huge police escort from the start of the march at the Cenotaph to Cabot Circus.

Avon and Somerset Police said it was ‘aware of several videos’ on social media and was reviewing them with an investigation is under way.

Several times, the marchers, who numbered around 40, were prevented from continuing the march by hundreds of counter-protesters who were determined to stop the march’s progress around the city centre. During one of those pauses, in Union Street, counter-protesters were able to unfurl a wide banner right across the road, and a shouting match ensued over the shoulders of police officers who were lined up in between the two sides.

A short video clip, which has been seen by the Post begins in the middle of a confrontation with Ferguson saying: “What are you going to do about it? I’m a neo-Nazi.”

The video is filmed by one of the counter-protesters who called Ferguson ‘scum!’

He replied: “Are you Jewish yeah? Heil Hitler,” a phrase he said three times. He then replied to calls for him to be arrested by saying three times: “It’s not an offence.”

“I have had briefings with the police,” he added, before the confrontation descended into obscenities on both sides, and Ferguson pointing at the person he was arguing with over the police lines by shouting ‘Jew’.

The 40 or so Bristol Patriots on the march then had to run a gauntlet of abuse as they were forced to go through a narrow gap between police lines and the corner of the Coffee#1 coffee shop to get onto the Horsefair.