Leading article: Mass arrests have no place in a democratic country
The police must use their pre-emptive powers with extreme care
Digg
del.icio.us
Facebook
Reddit
Google
Stumble Upon
Fark
Newsvine
YahooBuzz
Bebo
Twitter
Independent Minds
enlarge
There are times, and they seem to be growing more frequent, when the civil liberties we still associate with life in Britain suddenly start to look dangerously fragile. Yesterday was one such occasion. We woke up to the news that 114 people had been arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to commit aggravated trespass and criminal damage. This deserves to be spelled out. More than 100 people were arrested in the Sneinton Dale area of Nottingham not for committing an offence, but for allegedly planning to do so. In other words, they were arrested pre-emptively.
Now pre-emptive arrests may sometimes be justified: for instance, if there is evidence that an act of terrorism or other major life-threatening crime is nearing execution. But the evidence has to be persuasive, and it is often hard to convince a jury that a conspiracy to commit a crime existed, as acquittals under such circumstances show. People tend to be uncomfortable with the idea that someone can be arrested before a crime has been committed – and rightly so. It smacks of totalitarian regimes and the thought police.
The full facts of the Nottingham case have not been easy to assemble. But what is not disputed is that a large number of officers swooped on school premises where a meeting was in progress after midnight. A police spokesman said they found "specialist equipment" at the site and believed there was a serious threat to the coal-fired power station at Radcliffe-on-Soar.
An early assumption was that the school was the rendezvous point for a protest planned by climate change activists. The police described the operation as "intelligence-led", fuelling suspicions that the group might have been infiltrated. A city councillor said that if police had information that there was some kind of danger to the East Midlands power supply, then they needed to take action.
Yet however the raid came about, it should prompt questions. There is in this country, as in most democratic states, a right – express or implied – to free assembly. The mass arrest of more than 100 people gathered in the same place comes perilously close to infringing on that freedom.
There is also, and always must be, freedom to protest. The police made their arrests, citing conspiracy to commit aggravated trespass and criminal damage. The councillor hazarded that the planned action might have endangered the power supply across the region. The reference to equipment doubtless had a purpose, too.
But, if we have learned anything in recent months and years, it is that early accounts by police spokesmen to justify particular actions are not always to be relied upon. We saw this only 10 days ago after the death of Ian Tomlinson during the 1 April protests in the City of London. The police account of what happened in Nottingham in the early hours of Monday morning needs to be treated with similar rigour. Simply planning, or engaging in, a protest is not, and should never be, a reason for arrest.
The policing of climate change protests has often left a bitter taste. A Liberal Democrat report on the policing of last year's climate camp, at Kingsnorth power station in Kent, condemned the vast police operation for tactics designed to intimidate and provoke. At power stations, as at airports, conflicting rights and interests converge: the commercial rights of the owners and operators, the rights of the paying customer, and the right of protesters to make their case. If our civil liberties are to be preserved, the right to protest is as important as the other two.
View all comments that have been posted about this article.
Offensive or abusive comments will be removed and your IP logged and may be used to prevent further submission. In submitting a comment to the site, you agree to be bound by the Independent Minds Terms of Service.
- Print Article
- Email Article
-
Click here for copyright permissions
Copyright 2009 Independent News and Media Limited
Comments
What with this and the attacks on Ian Tomlinson and on G20 protesters, the requirement to obtain permission to protest within a mile of parliament, the new law against photographing police, over 1000 deaths in police custody in the last 30 years, mass surveillance of all our communications and travel, the impending ID cards which they have admitted they would like to make compulsory, the huge databases storing all our personal details, the 20 trillian CCTV cameras which, strangely, seem to show no footage when the police may be at fault .... one could be forgiven for thinking that Britain is no longer a place that is safe or free.
And who actually still believes the old "terrorism" story? A lie sold to justify heaps of repressive anti-democratic laws, which will probably now be used against these activists.
it the last 41 year there have been a 1000 deths in cutsody not 30 years
as for not believing that in ademocracy this action should take placeif there was a gang of organised pick pockets meeting ina warehouse to plan their morning job and were jst about to do it if the police swooped in and nicked them ,are you saying in a democracy that the polcie should n't do such a big job all at once
A minority ,however vocal , has no right to stop by violent means a lawful activity which is necessary for the majority of us. This group are similar in outlook to the extreme left animal rights activists as they believe right is on their side and anyone who disagrees with their approach is consigned to the outer darkness. Fortunately the animal rights activists are now in jail and this is where this bunch should go.
Just to be clear, what you are saying with regards to your 'they should be in prison' comment is that these people should be locked up for doing, literally, nothing.
http://throbgoblins.blogspot.com/2009/0
But yes, this is a very worrying development. Yes, think "1984", or "Minority Report": pre-emptive arrests only serve to further entrenched power interests.
Earlier Hansen acted as an expert defence witness at the trial for criminal damage by Green Peace activists at the Kingsnorth power station and was supported by Zac Goldsmith the Tory environmental adviser.
If the arrested activists were planning to disrupt power output from this station then it is tantamount to an conspiring in an act of terrorism, and Hansen must take some responsibility. Furthermore, how was it that protesters got access to a publicly funded school?
Danish and German experiences with wind power are disappointing to say the least and they have had to continue with coal fired generation to offset the variability of wind power. The UK is approaching a dire shortage of electrical power and it will be years before nuclear power stations come on line. Therefore it is necessary that some more coal fired generators are constructed as a stop gap.
The politicians cannot go on praising Hansen and his ilk by accepting the more extreme views of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change if they wish to keep the lights burning in what might be a rather cool period.
They confiscated someone's SOAP at Kingsnorth and tried to claim it was about to be used for something nefarious....yeah right. They raid the kitchen and claim they've found knives.....
Pre-emptive arrests, very dangerous territory. We have freedom no more.
They will come at night and take your loved ones, under the pretext that they might possibly be about to do something wrong.
I really never thought that this could happen here, but after Kingsnorth, the G20 and now this, where they always come at night, normally with violence, it's Orwellian, I'm sure most South Americans and Eastern Europeans will recognise this behaviour.
I have been at many "famous" protests in the 60s and 70s.
But you do have to get the facts right before you get up on that high horse -
it's long way down if you fall off that big old nag !
Conspircay IS a crime - I make no comment on whether they were conspiring or not.
Dont' we all applaud if the police can prove they actually prevented a crime,
instead of turning up a day late ?
It always makes me smile when people are willing to break the law - because of their " beliefs" -
but then immediately demand the protection of the law. All a little selective isn't it ?
I can remember people moaning about the police banging their shields in the Notting Hill riots
( oo err ! ) and yet supporting people who threw bricks (??)
Direct action is - as someone says - a type of fascism. If you believe in something strongly enough -
and you think you are right - you have to campaign and convince other people .
Direct action is a symptom of lazy, middle class frustration.
It's counter productive - just ask the people in the street .
forget politicians and newspapers, just ask the people if this type of action makes them feel strongly about environmental issues -!!
revolutionary it ain't !
It makes me very sad that this is the very country where in the 70s people were protesting constantly so their voices could be heard, then Thatcher came and what we read and see now is a direct result of the destruction of the country's soul. At least there are still people planning protests, even if they do get arrested...
Out comes the DNA swabs, another 100+ new files on the 'Subversive' database.
Totalitarian Britain, Fascist Britain.
Both liebour and the Police are all part of it.
One using the other, with us the public coming out the worse for it.
Not a Police state?, it is when this sort of thing starts....but where does it end?
I've had enough of it,
this Country needs a complete 'flush out' of it's system from top to bottom,
including the Politicians and the Police, especially them.
There is only one Political party that will do this.
Harman et al, are almost 'performing a bowel motion' just thinking about them, very much scared of them.
Even the majority of the Police are!!.
What these two institutions have been up to against the British Public needs reconciling.
Bring out the liver salts, come June we might get our first taste!.
The arrests that tok place can only be justified if there was evidence that every single indivudual arrested was planning to take part in an illegal act. Otherwise it is a large step down the very dangerous road of guilt by association,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbRL5YGZ
If they cannot, then there will need to be an inquiry at all levels, as the police will have committed the offence of illegal arrest and imprisonment.
with respect to the writer of the article, the function of the police is to keep the peace and prevent crime not catch criminals AFTER they have omitted it, better to prevent a murder than catch a murderer
If major conspiracies were prosecuted, the the small fry would not fall into the (prepared) 'conspiracy' trap, becauae they would not be driven to 'conspire' against an anti-democratic fascist State that has concocted enough defensive 'laws' (aka traps) to prosecute almost any and all of of for 'conspiracy'.
Where are these voices now? Is this what they secretly wanted all along?
That being so, I'd certainly expect the police, if they have foreknowledge of such a conspicracy, to arrest said conspirators. nad not just where Ratcliffe/Sora os concerned, but if they had good reason (aka intelligence) that a group of bad men were planning to do me or my familiy harm. In fcat I think I'd thank them for their prescience. Wouldn't you?
The police are acting very much out of control and something has to stop it, the last time we were in a position like this was back in the eighties and it took a week of mass rioting to force the government to rein in the police and that lasted pretty well until Blair took over.
I think conspiracy cases are very Orwellian, we have a situation where the judge (a mason) is more inclined to believe a policeman (a mason) than the eco-warrior in the dock, the judge has the power to direct and steer the case and not because the police are to be trusted, to be believed in but because they are the police despite the fact that statistically, the police having lied and covered up so many times are the last people to trust to tell the truth.
But what next for Britain? Are we going to see the 4 weapon pointed, razor wired camps outside London be used at some point? Is Alan Moore's vision of a 21st Century Britain going to materialise?
Mass arrests are the tool of the fascist, as Cronyblatcher says, the banana republic, not the tools of the founder of modern democracy, law and justice.
But as Britain and America found in Iraq and Afghanistan, they will find out so here, that they are their best recruiting sergeants for opposition and currently there are 114 families out there with anti-state malevolence and it will grow...
YOU CAN ONLY GET A FAIR TRIAL WITH A JURY and a good fair judge- who gives a toss if he's a mason?
Unfortunately, climate change will not be dealt with by scientists or engineers even with a well developed framework, any more than anything else is. Climate change will be ignored by politicians, business and the media; mother nature will take care of it and our species will suffer along with the rest
That may be true of some of those commenting, on all sides, but not all. Some of us do know what such places are like.
"While it may be great fun to break into the site, this is to put the protesters, the operators and the general public at very severe risk."
The evidence is that nobody intending to enter such a place for climate change reasons thinks it is fun. They would rather the government was doing something effective on climate change, in which case they could get on with doing other things. Instead they place themselves in some danger because of the threat of climate change. Protestors may endanger themselves, but that is their choice. The protestors understand what the mechanical and electrical risks are. They are very careful to minimise the risk, but it can never be reduced to zero.
The operators and general public are not put at any measurable risk by protestors, let alone very severe risk. Why not back up your assertion by telling us what very severe risks the protestors cause the operators and general public?