'Jihadi Jack's’ parents receive January trial date for terror funding case

John Letts and Sally Lane are accused of sending hundreds of pounds to 20-year-old Jack Letts

Jack Letts, in a picture he posted on Facebook, near the Tabqa Dam in Syria (Facebook)

The parents of the Muslim convert known as "Jihadi Jack" are to stand trial in January.

John Letts and Sally Lane are accused of sending hundreds of pounds to 20-year-old Jack Letts, who is believed to have joined Islamic State in 2014.

Letts and Lane have been charged with three counts of funding terrorism by allegedly sending their son £223 on September 2 last year, £1,000 on December 31 and £500 on January 4.

Lane is also charged with two counts of attempting to send payments of £500 on January 4.

Letts, 55, and his 54-year-old wife, from Oxford, did not enter any pleas to the charges at the Old Bailey on Thursday.

Nicholas Hilliard QC, the recorder for London, confirmed a trial date of January 9. The trial, at the Old Bailey, is expected to last up to four weeks.

Jack Letts was suspected of being the first white Briton to join the terror group after he left his Oxford home and travelled to war-ravaged Syria in 2014.

The 20-year-old reportedly goes by the name Abu Mohammed and married an Iraqi woman with whom he has a son, Muhammed.

His parents, of Chilswell Road, Oxford, were both released on bail.

Press Association