Police 'Abused Power' by Barring Anti-War Protesters

repost | 15.01.2004 12:29 | Anti-militarism | Repression | London

http://www.news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2412471
By Jan Colley, PA News

The police were guilty of an “abuse of power” in barring three coachloads of protesters from a demonstration against the war on Iraq, the High Court heard today.

Counsel for about 60 of the 120 passengers who were prevented from attending the vigil at RAF Fairford in March said that the action taken by Gloucestershire Police was unlawful.

Michael Fordham said: “We submit both by reference to well established common law and also by reference to human rights law, as it now is in domestic law from October 2000, that that police action was an abuse of power.

“We submit that the the police stepped well outside the legal parameters on their powers and that the action taken was unjustified.”

He told Lord Justice May and Mr Justice Harrison, sitting in London, that the three coaches from London were intercepted in a lay-by in Lechlade at 12.50pm, searched and items were seized.

At 2.15pm, the decision was taken to return the coaches to London non-stop under police escort because of the view taken about preventing violence by hard-core demonstrators.

Mr Fordham said that both the action of turning away and of forcible return were unlawful.

“This was a case of a preventative restraint, not because of anything that had happened but because of something that was said to be anticipated.”

He said that he did not accept that there would have been a breach of the peace on arrival at Fairford.

Nor did he accept that there were no steps which the police could have taken to consider the different passengers and to seek to differentiate between them.

He said that the operation at Fairford, which was used by American B-52 bombers, was the largest and most complex police operation ever undertaken by Gloucestershire Police.

“The day was very important to them and very important to those who wished to go to Fairford to exercise their rights of assembly and expression.”

The protesters were utterly opposed to the US-led military assault on Iraq and wished to exercise their deeply-held beliefs through peaceful protest.

Mr Fordham said that the police regarded their operation as a great success in achieving their strategic objectives of preventing violence and facilitating peaceful protest.

Gloucestershire Police, which are contesting the judicial review proceedings, argue that their officers were not only entitled to take the action they did – they were obliged to.

The case is expected to go into tomorrow with no immediate decision.

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The Right To Protest Denied

15.01.2004 19:00

I was on the second coach which had been stopped out of the three coaches in total and after all the occupants and coaches had been searched, we were told we couldn't proceed to R.A.F. Fairford and would be escorted back to London.
Several police officers from the Met's F.I.T. stated that the occupants on all three coaches were members of the WOMBLES group, which was a total lie, and the coaches were turned around and during the journey back to London several occupants tried in vain to get the drivers to pull over at service stations so people could use the facilities.
The police stopped them from doing so and even though the driver attempted to slow the second coach down to turn off into a service station he was prevented from doing so by the police who had covered the doors off the coaches with their own squad cars and vans.
I am not a member of the Wombles but have friends who are, but this shouldn't have been an excuse used by the police to prevent those occupants on the coaches from lawful protest at Fairford.
From what I noticed on that day when we were stopped, everyone cooperated with the police fully.
What the police did on the way back to London was unlawful due to not one person being placed under arrest on any of the coaches so why haven't we sued the police for false inprisonment, forcing the coaches to drive at high and dangerous speeds, endangering our lives by covering the front and rear doors of all the coaches so no one at any time could get off.
Should this review be successful at the High Court everyone on those coaches should contact their lawyers and sue all the police forces concerned in this operation, those who gave the orders should be made accountable for their actions.

Patrick
mail e-mail: Notorious.Heckler@btopenworld.com

Decision made four hours early

15.01.2004 20:56

If the scotsman's source had stayed in court till lunchtime, they would have heared from Micheal Fordham that the decision to 'turn around' the coaches was made by the police officer in charge of the operation at around 10am, conditional on at least ONE dangerous instrument or offensive weapon being found on any passenger. Anything pointy or sharp is considered a dangerous instrument.

The police officer instructed that we should not be arrested, as he did not consider that we posed an 'imminent' threat to breach the peace. It is difficult to see then how our being turned around, let alone kidnapped to London, could have appeard either necessary or lawful. In the event there appear not to have been any weapons or dangerous instruments discovered on the coaches or any passengers.

Simon Freeland QC and others will attempt to justify the police behaviour tommorow.

Fairford Coach Action has more information -

http://www.fairfordcoachaction.org.uk/.

would-be protester

more info on legal proceedings

16.01.2004 00:05

there's mor info pertinent to 'would be's remarks at a later indymedia report at

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2004/01/283973.html

rikki

Police Evidence Confirms Our Suspicions

16.01.2004 11:57

I was on one of the coaches too. I remember several things. Firstly as someone has pointed out above people complied fully with the police demands for the searches etc when they stopped the coaches miles from fairford. They mostly let us out of the coaches only in ones or twos depending on which coach you were on, filming each person while they were told to wait in the doors, before being searched, very thoroughly two at a time outside the vehicles (i think on the third coach more people got off though).

The thing I remember was thinking

a) if they're filming each of us in such a detailed manner then we're propably going to be allowed to continue to fairford, it was just they wanted to film the clothing, shoes etc of each person so they could identify individuals at a later stage.

b) then i thought, like many people, that because the searches were taking such a long long time that the real intent was simply to delay us sufficiently that we would miss the bulk of the demonstration. The searches lasted for around two hours, and given that the coaches were already running a little late, this seemed to ring true. I remember one person asked a police officer if this was the intent and got a reply that , yes it was 'unfortunate'. While they had a good number of police in the immediate area, they had very few tasked to do the actual searches. The same person was also told that people were being searched on individual officers discretion - well the police evidence yesterday proved this to be a lie.

So now we have the proof that the whole thing was planned in advance and even that the return to london was pre-planned - this was again something we had become suspicious of given that it was such a big operation (returning the coaches to london along the motorway). They clearly overstepped their powers. I also remember chatting with people and calls being made to solicitors etc and being told that the police may have been in their powers to arrest people there and then, but not to return us to london under this bloody non stop convoy escort.

coach captive

Police Intelligence + FIT

16.01.2004 12:53

"Several police officers from the Met's F.I.T. stated that the occupants on all three coaches were members of the WOMBLES group"

Wow! if they really said this (and I'm not saying your report isn't true) then it's utterly AMAZING! Esp as other reports have said that other police intelligence (is that the intelligent intelligence then?) had reported that the occupants were a mix of individuals and others from several different groups.

Maybe the Forward Iintelligence Team team took that banner I remember from some past demo: "We Are All Wombles" a bit too literally?! I mean they can't seriously have believed this.

Anyway, it's clear that the police are talking quite a bit of rubbish in respect to this case. Let's hope common sense prevails.

TIT

No Differentiation Indeed.

16.01.2004 14:09

There were several journalists on the coaches. They weren't allowed to proceed to Fairford either. There certainly wasn't any differentiation between passengers! Did they raise this with the National Union of Journalists I wonder?

Pete
mail e-mail: -

so you're saying...

16.01.2004 16:55

that the poile were justified in denying basic human rights? That they were justified in refusing to let a lady use the toilet, but instead making her use a sandwich box in front of them?

I seriously think that you are misguided. You cannot stereotype all anti-war campaigners as trouble makers! A lot of the protesters at the anti-war demo's happened to be students. Are they all anarchists waiting to riot? Did you not stop to think that they might actually be against the war, so if they were allowed to protest properly that they wouldn't have done anything illegal?

Most riots are caused by the police - FACT. They infiltrate groups and encourage them to do illegal activities, or the police arrest someone for absolutely no reason - leading to mass disapproval and eventually a riot.

I am guessing that your name is irrelevant, but i do think that you are probably just someone trying to cause trouble.

Before you start justifying the illegal acts of the police, try reading the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the UK's laws which follow it.

fredrico
mail e-mail: musteatvegan@yahoo.co.uk