Skip Nav | Home | Mobile | Editorial Guidelines | Mission Statement | About Us | Contact | Help | Security | Support Us

World

Jonnie Marbles Sent to Jail: Stop the Punitive Sentencing of Protesters Now

Defend the Right to Protest | 02.08.2011 16:59 | Other Press | Policing | World

Jonnie Marbles (aka Jonnie May-Bowles), 26, who attempted to throw a foam pie at Rupert Murdoch at the House of Commons culture committee on July 19th, had pleaded guilty to common assault and was today sentenced to six weeks imprisonment of which he will serve three, and ordered to pay a fine of £250 plus £15 ‘victim surcharge’. Murdoch had not wanted to press charges, but the court proceeded anyway.

SIGN THE PETITION TO FREE JONNIE NOW.

District Judge Daphne Wickham, who sentenced Jonnie, is the same person who let Sgt Delroy Smellie off the hook for assaulting Nicola Fisher at the G20 protest in 2009, despite YouTube footage of the officer striking at Fisher with his hand and a baton.

Jonnie Marbles
Jonnie Marbles


Jonnie’s excessive sentence for a prank that hurt no one, committed by someone with no criminal record, against a man whose media empire has ruined lives, is yet more evidence of government crackdown on dissent. The decision to proceed with the case and to punish Jonnie for essentially embarrassing Parliament’s security arrangements, and for rightly pointing out what a mockery the Murdoch hearing was, is on a continuum with recent incredibly punitive sentences handed down to protesters on student protests, union demos and other actions, as well as with the Met’s attempt to get people to turn anarchists into the police (now vaguely retracted

).

It is clear the police, the courts and the government are severely rattled by individuals and groups expressing their opposition to government policy and to corruption at the highest levels, as recently and spectacularly revealed in the case of News International’s ties to police, press and government in the hacking scandal. The information gathering explicitly carried out by police on protesters, students, members of UK Uncut and squatters is further evidence that the government are increasingly using the category of ‘domestic extremist’ to tarnish anyone voicing their opposition to government policies (for more information on the ongoing attempt to criminalise squatting see the SQUASH campaign website).

DTRTP extends their solidarity to Jonnie Marbles and with all other protesters recently charged and sentenced: end political policing and sentencing NOW – as @copwatcher puts it: ‘Six weeks in prison for breach of the peace and common assault is vengeance, not justice’.

Defend the Right to Protest
- Homepage: http://defendtherighttoprotest.org/jonnie-marbles-sent-to-jail/458/

Comments

Display the following 5 comments

  1. scam alert — scam alert
  2. justice for all prisoners — An anarchist
  3. You don't have to pay — sgl
  4. scam half true - you can sign for free — frenchside
  5. Probably get deleted — workingclassguy

Publish

Publish your news

Do you need help with publishing?

/regional publish include --> /regional search include -->

World Topics

Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista

Kollektives

Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World

Other UK IMCs
Bristol/South West
London
Northern Indymedia
Scotland

Server Appeal Radio Page Video Page Indymedia Cinema Offline Newsheet

secure Encrypted Page

You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.

If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

IMCs


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech