FREE BABAR AHMAD

11 April 2012

URGENT ALERT: Write to the Director of Public Prosecutions and demand that Babar Ahmad be put on trial in the UK

Further to the judgement of the European Court of Human Rights which ruled that Babar Ahmad and others could be extradited to the US, the Free Babar Ahmad (FBA) Campaign urges all supporters to write to the Director of Public Prosecutions to demand that Babar be put on trial in the UK immediately.

It has now become very clear that the bulk of the evidence gathered by British police was provided directly to the US authorities without the Crown Prosecution Service CPS ever reviewing it, a fact now admitted by the CPS.

This is a very serious abuse of process which has resulted in a man being detained without trial for almost 8 years, the equivalent of a 16 year criminal sentence.

In the case of Regina v Sheppard & Whittle [2010] involving the possession, publication and internet distribution of racially inflammatory material hosted on a remote server in the US, Lord Justice Scott Baker ruled that the UK was the appropriate forum for trial because a “substantial measure of the activities” constituting the crime (the operation, maintenance and collation of all material for the website) took place in the UK.

Babar too is accused of operating, maintaining and collating material for a website from the UK which was simply hosted by a remote server in the US for a period of a few months. Therefore, the correct forum for a trial for Babar should be the UK and not the US.


Please write to the Director of Public Prosecutions, Keir Starmer, and request that he order Babar Ahmad be put on trial immediately.

Please send your emails to  keir.starmer@cps.gsi.gov.uk

We encourage supporters to prepare their own letters using the above points. A sample letter is below for your convenience but a personalised letter always carries more weight.

Kindly send a copy of your correspondence and any replies received to  dpp@freebabarahmad.com .



Sample Letter



Dear Mr Starmer

Re: Prosecution of Babar Ahmad

I am writing to request that you order the Crown Prosecution Service to bring charges against Babar Ahmad and put him on trial immediately.

Babar Ahmad is a British citizen accused of very serious crimes allegedly committed in the UK. Moreover the bulk of the evidence against him was gathered in the UK. It seems only right then that he should be tried in a British court of law.

I understand that the CPS has for over 8 years insisted that there has been “insufficient evidence” to charge Mr. Ahmad with any offence. Yet the CPS admitted in November 2011 that they had never reviewed all of the evidence seized from Mr. Ahmad’s house before it was sent by the police to their US counterparts. This is all the more appalling when seen against the backdrop of a man being detained without trial for almost 8 years.

I am sure you are familiar with the case of Regina v Sheppard & Whittle [2010] in which Lord Justice Scott Baker ruled that the UK was the appropriate forum for trial in a case involving the possession, publication and internet distribution of racially inflammatory material hosted on a remote server in the US. This was because a “substantial measure of the activities” constituting the crime took place in the UK, as is similarly the case with Mr Ahmad.

Almost 150,000 members of the British public signed an e-petition calling for Mr Ahmad to be put on trial in the UK and the matter has significant cross party support. Judge Timothy Workman, who ruled on Mr Ahmad’s case in 2005, said that

“This is a difficult and troubling case. The defendant is a British Citizen who is alleged to have committed offences which if the evidence were available, could have been prosecuted in this country."

It seems this evidence would have been available had the police not sent it to the US before the CPS could consider it. The situation needs to be rectified immediately by putting Mr Ahmad on trial in a British court of law so he can answer the allegations against him.

Yours sincerely,