Alan Leggett, from Grimsby in Lincolnshire, goes by the name “Active Patriot” and is one of the most prominent “migrant hunter” activists in the UK. In the past, Leggett was a loyal acolyte of Tommy Robinson, and tried to imitate his idol by also transforming himself into a so-called “citizen journalist”.

Leggett has in the past tried to mimic the Tommy Robinson-style public documentary airings, playing a film about “Muslim grooming gangs” on a portable screen, often outside police stations around the north of England. Audiences for these events were tiny across the board. However, Leggett’s decision to film the screenings themselves meant he was able to produce a large quantity of content for his social media channels. This has helped to propel him and his accounts to greater prominence over the past two or so years, despite falling out with many figures across the movement.

In 2022, Leggett began targeting migrant accommodation in earnest, making at least 38 trips to film and harass both occupants and staff. A close associate of Amanda Smith (AKA Yorkshire Rose), the pair made many such visits together, and in 2023 that relationship continued, with Leggett making at least 27 migrant accommodation visits, many of them alongside Smith. Leggett also appeared at a number of anti-migrant protests throughout 2023, including in Dover, Hull, Lincoln and Skegness.

Outside of his usual filming excursions around the Midlands, Yorkshire, North East and North West in 2023, Leggett had a tumultuous year. In February, he was dealt a heavy blow with the banning of his YouTube account, along with subsequent ones he attempted to set up. In March, Leggett was charged with racially-aggravated threatening abusive words or behaviour after he filmed a suspected grooming gang case in Bradford in September 2022. August saw Leggett in trouble with the law once more, with him being found guilty of malicious communications regarding a video dating back to 2020. In October, Leggett was sentenced for a different malicious communications charge dating back three years, and was subjected to a long list of sanctions, including a ten month prison sentence suspended for two years and a fifteen year restraint order.