from the archives:


One person’s account of a train action – From DSEI 2003


We were a small affinity group of about eight, that wanted to take action against the arms fair but were unable to take an action together that involved lots of preparation, and the train action was ideal. It turned out to be straightforward, effective and VERY replicable.

We met in a cafe about five minute's walk away from the station that we had chosen to take action in. We listened to traffic reports on the radio that told us the DLR was down due to one protester d -locking himself onto the front of a train. Once news came through that the DLR was up and running, we decided to walk over to the station in order to shut it down again!

We had not done a reccie on the station beforehand and I for one was assuming that ft was an underground station but it turned out to be elevated about 30 feet in the air running above the road.

The plan was to wait on the platform as subtley as possible. Some of our group were smartly dressed as city workers/delegates, and others as builders, complete with copies of The Sun to read. There were no police or train staff in sight on the platform, and within a couple of minutes the train arrived. People immediately pulled the emergency cord as planned, and told guards that were on the train that there were protesters on the roof and that it was therefore unsafe to move the train. [DLR trains do not have drivers but during DSE1 all trains seemed to carry guards and some of them carried police as well. There were reports of undercover police on some trains but we did not see any in uniform or otherwise.]

Meanwhile three of the group gave leg ups to three others and within a couple of seconds we had three people on the roof, it was very simple to get up, though it could have been problematic if it had been raining and therefore potentially very slippy. Two of the group on the roof locked onto each other while I was free to walk up and down the roof. The latter tactic seemed to be more of a problem for the police and climbing team than removing those sat down back to back with d-locks joining them at the neck.

The rest of the group gave out leaflets to all the passengers on the train, most of who were quite obviously DSEi delegates. The staff quickly closed down the station and the rest of the group were asked to leave along with all the passengers. One group member was later arrested out on the street but the rest were able to observe the goings on without any police hassle and then able to join the rest of the disarm DSEi protests.

After a few minutes police began to arrive in greater and greater numbers accompanied by a climbing team. They tried to talk us down and after about 1+ hours climbers came up onto the roof with cutting equipment and removed the two women who were locked on. I told the police that I would prefer to jump onto the tracks than have them grab me and therefore they should stay away from me. They seemed to think that they were dealing with a possible martyr intent on killing themselves, rather than someone threatening to sacrifice a twisted ankle in order to delay removal as long as possible. They then placed around 30 police all along the track in case I carried out my threat (not that I would have wanted or expected any of them to catch me). However it did seem to give me more time, leaving me free to walk up and down the roof of the carriage and keep a close eye on what the police were doing both inside and outside the carriages and watch out for any strategically placed ladders. I was pretty sure they would not risk chasing me along the roof and possibly slipping or jumping and therefore it turned out to be a very useful if unplanned tactic. The electrified tracks themselves had immediately been made safe by staff when we stopped the train.

After 2+ hours I stupidly engaged myself in a conversation with the top cop, thus distracting me long enough for the climbing team to get the ladder up and jump on me! The police climbing team did not hurt any of us, though once we made contact with them we did not resist arrest or struggle in any way.

And so, after almost three hours the DLR began to run again, but not for long. The next group, after having waited patiently, stopped it again within minutes and went through the whole thing again at a different station! These and other actions continued throughout the day and disabled the DLR and therefore many of the delegates as this seemed to be their main way of getting into the exhibition. Eventually they were re-routed to Excel in blue buses.


- COURT etc.

We were arrested under an old act relating to the railways. The worrying thing was that they said we had endangered life and the maximum sentence was life imprisonment, though we didn't for a minute think that we were in danger of that, or even of a prison sentence.

The charge was later dropped to the less serious version "unlawful act with intent to obstruct the railway - malicious damages act 1861 8.35". This is an either way offence and we were scheduled to appear in Snaresbrook Crown Court (1) after opting for a jury to hear our case. However despite lengthy preparations for a 'political' defence, the judge refused to accept that we could run our chosen defence and we therefore decided that it left us with little option- to run a defence at all, and especially in front of a jury.

And so, we pleaded guilty, though agreed to do this on the condition that the charges were dropped for one of the group. Another was given a conditional discharge as she was of previous 'good character'. We did read out a statement as to what we thought of the legal process explaining why we disagreed with the judge for disallowing our defence and why we believed we were right to take the action we did. Of course this didn't make a blind bit of difference to the judge, though it made us feel better.

The two of us with previous criminal record told the judge that we would not be paying any fines imposed or agree with any community punishment order as we did not believe we were guilty of a crime. This initially backfired as he decided that in the face of such impudence he would sentence us to 3 months in jail and sent us down to prepare for Holloway. We had expected a few days at the most. In shock we went down to the cells, filled out all the paperwork and awaited the van to take us to prison. Fortunately, and surprisingly, the CPS came to our rescue, as they, and not our own brief, realised that the judge had acted incorrectly. He did not have the power to impose a jail term until we had gone away and consistently refused to turn up to the probation appt. to serve our community punishment order. And so back up to the courtroom we went and the judge, a little sheepishly, sentenced us to 40 hours community service each (2), this was ten hours less than he had originally planned to give us and so after the initial shock of 3 months in the nick it did not seem to be such a bad result.

The sentencing from other actions where people were charged with same thing were mainly conditional discharge, for those of 'good character', and those with previous received fines of £4-500.


- LOOKING BACK -

All in all we were very happy with the way the action went, but if we were to improve on anything, it would be to spread ourselves a little thinner with less people in our group and two maximum, on the top of each train. That way it would enable others and those not arrested to go back out and shut down more trains the next day or later the same day. From what I have heard since, there were so many groups just waiting for the DLR to start again, so that they could shut it down, between us we could have shut down the DLR for most of the three days. I also think that the d-locks gave us less time on top, than being free roaming.

Another thing that I think that we could have done in hindsight is immediately put the action details onto Indymedia and explains how we did it and how effective it was. In that way we could let groups that we didn't know about and/or those who were maybe looking for something to do, to get out there over the next couple of days and do it all over again.


- OTHER ACTIONS -

Others that were stopping trains went further and climbed from the roof trains, onto overhangs and they reckon that they were able to hold those positions for longer than they would have been able to if they had simply been walking around on the roof. Although some of these needed more care to be taken in order to be as safe as possible.

I also heard reports about another great train action where there were no arrests but long stoppages on the network. This involved people with a very long piece of chain and a padlock/d-lock. When a train came to a station they threw one end of the chain out of the window nearest to the door and then pulled it tight around the open door and then locked it - voila! simple and effective.

(1) For those who have not been there already, Snaresbrook Crown Court is set in beautiful grounds on the edge of Epping Forest so if you need help to stay sane in the middle of lots of legal nonsense, bring a picnic and a newspaper/good book and take the time to walk into Epping Forest for your lunch or before your appearance as Epping Forest is sure to feed your soul. If you can, cycle there if coming from Central London it is great fun to cycle around too.

(2) We have both since served our community service in a charity shop run by a fab Irish woman, who made our time there fly and it did not feel like a punishment at all. Haringey would not allow us to take the gardening option, as it was only open to men!