Ayr Sheriff Acquits Seven Prestwick Protesters
TP | 11.08.2007 10:39 | Anti-militarism | Terror War | World
War crime was an issue, claims expert witness
Following the acquittal of seven of the eight Prestwick protesters at Ayr Sheriff Court due to inadequacies in the Crown case a prominent expert witness testified that collusion in war crime was relevant to the context of the trial.
Following the acquittal of seven of the eight Prestwick protesters at Ayr Sheriff Court due to inadequacies in the Crown case a prominent expert witness testified that collusion in war crime was relevant to the context of the trial.
The Eight People on Trial in Ayr 8-10 August 2007
Paul Rogers, Professor of Peace Studies at Bradford University told the court that war crime by Israel was very much an issue at the time of the incident at the airport. Israel had been breaching international law by targeting its air strikes in Lebanon at areas and installations liable to contain civilians. They had asked the US for an emergency top-up supply of bombs. US planes delivering these armaments would need a fuel stop-over in the UK and Prestwick was one of the options.
The accused activists carried out inspections of Prestwick Airport on the night of the 6th/7th August last year to look for evidence of US munitions bound for Israel for use in the Lebanon conflict. Facing trial were Matt Bury (50) from Somerset, Sarah Lasenby (68) from Oxford, Jean Oliver (48) and Douglas Shaw (56), both from Biggar, Olivia Agate (65) from Helensburgh, Marcus Armstrong (46) from Milton Keynes, Chris Bluemel (25) from Southampton, and Angie Zelter (55) from Cromer.
All eight accused were facing a charge of trespass, or in the case of Olivia, a charge of aiding and abetting a trespass. At the end of the prosecution case, a defence submission that there was no case to answer on that charge was accepted by Sheriff Montgomery. This left Angie, Marcus and Chris facing the other charge, that of being on an aircraft without permission. The Crown had already accepted that in the case of Angie there was lack of identification and the Sheriff decided this was also true for Chris. He was however persuaded by the prosecution argument that given the circumstances it could be inferred that Marcus did not have the required permission.
Marcus’ trial has been adjourned until Monday.
Angie said: "I am delighted that when Paul Rogers gave his evidence the real issue got the attention of the court at long last. Since there was good reason to suspect that Prestwick was colluding in war crime we had every justification for doing what we did. The big worry is that it was left to ordinary citizens like us to act when there were whole layers which should have taken responsibility, from the Scottish Executive, through the police, down to the airport authorities and the civilian contractors. All the way down it was the same sorry story. Not my problem, nothing to do with me, I am just doing my job. Our whole society needs to be educated in the Nuremberg Principles and their insistence on the duty of everyone to recognise their responsibility and act to uphold international law."
The accused activists carried out inspections of Prestwick Airport on the night of the 6th/7th August last year to look for evidence of US munitions bound for Israel for use in the Lebanon conflict. Facing trial were Matt Bury (50) from Somerset, Sarah Lasenby (68) from Oxford, Jean Oliver (48) and Douglas Shaw (56), both from Biggar, Olivia Agate (65) from Helensburgh, Marcus Armstrong (46) from Milton Keynes, Chris Bluemel (25) from Southampton, and Angie Zelter (55) from Cromer.
All eight accused were facing a charge of trespass, or in the case of Olivia, a charge of aiding and abetting a trespass. At the end of the prosecution case, a defence submission that there was no case to answer on that charge was accepted by Sheriff Montgomery. This left Angie, Marcus and Chris facing the other charge, that of being on an aircraft without permission. The Crown had already accepted that in the case of Angie there was lack of identification and the Sheriff decided this was also true for Chris. He was however persuaded by the prosecution argument that given the circumstances it could be inferred that Marcus did not have the required permission.
Marcus’ trial has been adjourned until Monday.
Angie said: "I am delighted that when Paul Rogers gave his evidence the real issue got the attention of the court at long last. Since there was good reason to suspect that Prestwick was colluding in war crime we had every justification for doing what we did. The big worry is that it was left to ordinary citizens like us to act when there were whole layers which should have taken responsibility, from the Scottish Executive, through the police, down to the airport authorities and the civilian contractors. All the way down it was the same sorry story. Not my problem, nothing to do with me, I am just doing my job. Our whole society needs to be educated in the Nuremberg Principles and their insistence on the duty of everyone to recognise their responsibility and act to uphold international law."
TP
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Unclear on the concept
11.08.2007 19:49
But I do not understand why the claim of innocence to tresspassing and fail to understand whether or not evidence had been obtained is relevant or why "need" is relevant. Try to help me out here.
Members of your police force (we'll start there) has reason to believe that by searching a particular location evidence of a crime can be found. Instead of approaching a magistrate for a search warrant, perhaps because they feel that a warrant would not be granted, simply tresspass to conduct a search.
a) Whether or not evidence has been found, guilty of tresspass?
b) If evidence has been found, would the evidence be admissible in a court of law?
(by recent screwed up Supreme Court decisions here, accidentally or incidentally obtained evidence is admissible -- say they had a warrant for address A but MISTAKENLY entered B, would be admissible. But even here not yet if INTENTIONAL)
Try answering these further questions.
c) If the police (or to make it even more a parallel) private citizens feel that there is evidence of wrongdoing to be obtained by searching your house without a warrant, you feel that they have a right to do so? That they wouldn't be at least guilty of tresspass? Are you sure you want to go down that road, because guess what, as activists, we are the ones who would be searched.
d) A peaceful action? Explain why so. This might be a difference in our laws, but in most of our jurisdictions simply busting in somewhere is an invitation to a contest of deadly force with the invader in all cases being considered the attacker (what the intentions of the invader might be not considered relevant). The police can usually get away with it because they are well armed and so a householder being invaded by them (without a warrant) knows it would be suicidal to resist. Ordinary citizens?
Mike Novack
e-mail:
stepbystpefarm mtdata.com
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