July 7th People's Independent Inquiry Forum -> The UK's Burgeoning Police State

The UK's Burgeoning Police State, The criminalisation of everyone

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Bridget

Posted: Oct 27 2009, 01:48 AM

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QUOTE

Kingsnorth: How climate protesters were treated as threat to the country

* Rob Evans and Paul Lewis
* guardian.co.uk, Monday 26 October 2009 22.12 GMT

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Kingsnorth protest: Police arrest a climate change campaigner.

Police were in no mood for a "softly-softly" approach when climate change campaigners began their demonstration outside Kingsnorth power station in Kent last year. Their response was harsh and expensive � and has been roundly criticised. The �5m operation involved putting demonstrators, including children, through a total of 8,000 searches at airport-style checkpoints.

Loud music was blasted out to spoil protesters' sleep during the week-long camp, and more than 2,000 possessions were confiscated, including party poppers, a clown costume and camping equipment. Protesters were aghast; they were staging a piece of political theatre to publicise the dangers of global warming. The police looked on them, it seems, as a far graver threat, bent on putting out the nation's lights.

Without perhaps many of the activists realising it, their demonstration was colliding with an established official mindset focused on potential terrorists or saboteurs. It is a culture that conforms with a change in the way political activists have become viewed by the UK authorities.

Yesterday the Guardian revealed that a national apparatus has been created for dealing with so-called "domestic extremists", a category of political activist that has no legal basis. Working under the auspices of the Association of Chief Police Officers, three barely-known police units receive �9m to help monitor protesters across the country.

However, another little-known but formidable Whitehall, military and MI5 apparatus exists to protect Britain from such threats, originally designed during the cold war. Highly classified lists of so-called economic key points include power stations and airports, as well as oil terminals, military bases, and government buildings. Together, these comprise the Critical National Infrastructure.

The government's Centre for the Protection of National Infrastructure has special access to secret intelligence. The CPNI, working for the security service, MI5, aims to protect the "key infrastructure which are crucial to the continued delivery of essential services to the UK".

Because "severe economic damage, grave social disruption or large-scale loss of life" would result if communications, energy and transport were ruptured, companies in these sectors are helped by security officials. Like the banks, they are thought too big to be allowed to fail. During the second world war, MI5 advised on the protection of arsenals, dockyards, railways and weapons factories. Hundreds more sites were designated as economic key points during the cold war to be protected from imagined teams of Soviet saboteurs. The IRA was discovered in the 1990s to be planning to blow up London's electricity supply, adding impetus to the project.

Leaked documents from the 1990s show that a Cabinet Office committee divided the key points into four categories � nuclear installations were the most crucial and were labelled "super priority key points". But even 60-year-old documents on the subject in the National Archives are still concealed from the public on national security grounds.

Critics say police today are overreacting to political stunts which are not a serious threat to infrastructure. Superintendent Steve Pearl, head of the National Extremist Tactical Co-ordinating Unit [Netcu], disagrees. He said: "I've never said � and we don't see � that any environmentalist is going to or has committed any violent acts. But once they start going into outright criminal acts, which breaking into a power station is, and shutting it down, which breaking into an airport is, and shutting it down � are you saying that the police should just turn a blind eye to that because it's just grandstanding? It's not, it's serious criminal action."

As a result of these attitudes, government officials, police and the power station's owner, German-owned E.ON, worked hard together against the Kingsnorth protesters last year. Documents released to the Guardian give a glimpse of their approach.

Regional officials in "resilience teams" began to call together various departments weeks before the demonstration. Officials decided demonstrations might spread to other Kent energy sites. A month beforehand, they drew up a "list of major energy (oil terminals and refineries and associated jetties, gas storage and import terminals, electricity power stations) sites on the Thames and Medway estuaries". They wanted to know the "identified protest containment area location agreed with police force" for each site.

Behind the scenes, officials began to assess for each establishment "the impact on relevant sector if site lost for a) 1-12 hours, b) 12-24 hours, c) 24 hours plus". Particular attention was paid to the liquefied natural gas terminal run by BP at the Isle of Grain. Although there was "a very low risk" of a demonstration there, BP made contingency plans because the site supplies 10% of the aviation fuel for Heathrow and Gatwick .

Privately, officials knew it was "unlikely that disruption at any of the power stations in the area in this week would cause a national electrical power supply problem" because demand was low and power stations had good stocks.

Three weeks before the Kingsnorth demonstration, Whitehall's business department sent E.ON a "strategy document which was written and circulated this week from � the environmental protest community".

On the eve of the protest, on 28 July, Superintendent Rick Algar, of the Metropolitan police public order unit, sent a fresh summary of intelligence on what protesters were thought to be planning.

Willy Rickett, a senior Whitehall official, told one MP: "We were party to police reports passed between E.ON and ourselves, but in no way did [the business department] play any part in the police operation on the ground."

Police continued to receive intelligence as protesters marched from London to Kingsnorth. They reported "intelligence that [campaigners] will be diverted on 1 August � to hang banners or shine messages on the oil storage tanks" at Littlebrook power station on the Thames, owned by RWE Npower. German-owned RWE feared campaigners would also protest at its coal-fired power station at Tilbury. Documents detail how RWE "reported police intelligence" about "potential for protests on August 5/6" [at other sites].

As activists started camping at Kingsnorth, police reported "intelligence coming out" [of the camp] of plans to try to shut a nearby incinerator. E.ON joined a closed meeting of police and officials to decide on tactics.

Excitable news continued: "Intelligence suggests that the protesters have an 'airborne unit' where they have a hang-glider which they may use to try and infiltrate the power station". This never happened.

Kier

Posted: Oct 27 2009, 08:58 PM

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QUOTE

My life as 'suspect A'

The 'domestic extremist' label brings with it police harassment � from violent arrest to being photographed breastfeeding

o Emily Apple
o guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 27 October 2009 18.30 GMT

I am suspect A on the spotter card printed by the Guardian, and I am, in the eyes of the police force, a "domestic extremist". This comes as no surprise to me nor did it come as any surprise to my friends, family or colleagues. I made a difficult decision to go public with the Kingsnorth story � when video footage showing me being violently arrested made the front pages � and so it didn't make much difference to my life to be splashed across the national media labelled as a "domestic extremist."

As highlighted today, "domestic extremist" is a term propagated by an unaccountable private company, the Association of Chief Police Officers.It seems to span anything from attending the wrong meetings, associating with other "known" people, being seen at protests and supporting or taking part in any form of direct action. Superintendent David Hartshorn, a senior figure in the Metropolitan police's public order branch recently testified at a Fitwatch trial as to what's required to make it onto Scotland Yard's picture database, stating it only takes "more than passing contact" with someone already known or a subjective assessment about the way someone is "behaving" to warrant admission.

I wasn't shocked to find myself on the spotter card when it was discovered in 2005 � although I was surprised to find myself at the top of it. Unfortunately, I can't say the same for others on the card, many of whom have no criminal records, and have struggled to keep their political lives separate from their professional/family lives. The Guardian's decision to print the spotter card, without permission from those pictured and without blurring their faces is deeply regrettable.

Inclusion on the spotter cards has nothing to do with keeping tabs on domestic extremists and everything to do with harassment. If the police really believe they have grounds to monitor us there are plenty of covert methods at their disposal. In 2005, they didn't need a riot van full of cops to follow myself and my 18-month-old child after meetings. Similarly, in 2004, it was unnecessary to repeatedly use flash photography while I was breastfeeding my son.

Still, we are lucky. My organisation, Fit Watch, was formed in response to more than 10 years of harassment and intimidation of protesters by police forward intelligence teams (Fit), and we, and others have worked hard to expose police misbehaviour � and the policing of these sort of protests is starting to change. Unfortunately other groups are not so lucky. A recent Fit Watch trial centred around our arrest for obstructing Fits who were repeatedly following and photographing a group of young Asian males, who by the police's own admission, had done nothing more than act "as a group" and be "young and male". Although there are damaging consequences for those of us labelled as domestic extremists, at least we are not on a database of potential Islamic terrorists for having the audacity to be angry at the slaughter in Gaza.

It is really important to mark some of the abuses which have happened in the past, and I am glad after so many years of harassment to have a voice. However, it is more important we fight to ensure these abuses do not continue happening to others, and show these practices are not acceptable at any protests.

The Guardian

The Antagonist

Posted: Oct 27 2009, 09:33 PM

Antagonista

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QUOTE

From The Times
October 28, 2009
Police Federation chief condemns extension of Al Capone powers
Sean O�Neill, Crime Editor

The chairman of the Police Federation has condemned the extension of asset-seizing powers to civilian investigators and local government officials as dangerous.

Paul McKeever told The Times that he was shocked to learn that the decision to hand over �intrusive powers� to people who were not police officers was made by ministers without widespread consultation or debate.

His concerns are shared by leading legal figures, who believe there is a real risk that local authorities could abuse the powers to search people�s homes, seize their money, freeze their accounts and confiscate their property. They have also questioned whether there are adequate resources to train the agencies to a proper standard.

�The Proceeds of Crime Act is a very powerful tool in the hands of police and police-related agencies and it shouldn�t be treated lightly,� Mr McKeever said. �There is a behind-the-scenes creep of powers occurring here and I think the public will be very surprised. They would want such very intrusive powers to be kept in the hands of warranted police officers and other law enforcement bodies which are vetted to a very high standard rather than given to local councils and other bodies.

�You could hardly call me a liberal, but I am shocked at this � it seems to be a very dangerous move.�

Lawyers who specialise in confiscation law have been expressing concern about the extension of the powers for some time. One judge said: �It looks like this has been sneaked through.�

Andrew Bodnar, co-editor of a book on asset recovery law, said that the Proceeds of Crime Act had been carefully crafted and designed but its implementation often left much to be desired.

�The theory behind the law of confiscation is right: to punish the offender, to deter others and to make sure that criminal assets cannot be used to commit further crimes.

�But if these powers are to be used to seize the assets of � to take an extreme example � fare dodgers or council tax defaulters, it is very difficult to see how those theoretical aims are being met.

�The extension of these powers should be monitored very closely. The spectre of counter-terrorism powers being used to monitor people�s bin-filling habits, or what school they�re trying to send their children to, should be cautionary. There is potential for these powers to cause hardship.�

Mr Bodnar, of Matrix Chambers, said that the agencies given the powers must be resourced properly and be able to apply them �with a full understanding of the law�.

�There is also question mark over whether there are sufficient resources to train all these people from all these other agencies to the right standard,� he said.

�Having these Al Capone powers in the back pocket is very valuable for a senior prosecutor but in the hands of someone less experienced and less skilled, particularly when combined with the incentive of their department collecting a share of the confiscated money, there is the potential for charges to be brought which are intended to maximise confiscation recovery rather than reflect the level of criminality concerned.�

Sir Ivan Lawrence, QC, a former senior Conservative MP, said that extending such police powers to bodies like Transport for London and local authorities was highly questionable.

�Far worse is the encouragement being given to non-police bodies to search for what they think are proceeds of crime but may not be and subject the victim to the draconian and manifestly unjust processes of the Proceeds of Crime Act. Does anyone in Government understand that if you give prosecutors, who are supposed to be unbiased ministers of justice, the bribe of a proportion of the money they can find, you are actually poisoning the roots of justice in our society?�

The Home Office defended the extension of the powers as a way to further ensure that criminals did not profit by breaking the law.

�Seizing ill-gotten gains is a key part of the fight against criminals � whether it is from small-time offences or organised crime,� said a spokesman.

�Accredited financial investigators have played an integral role in the recovery of criminal assets since the Proceeds of Crime Act was introduced in 2003, they are fully trained and their powers carefully controlled in law.

�By giving them some new powers we are extending the fight against crime and freeing up valuable police time.�

justthefacts

Posted: Oct 27 2009, 10:44 PM

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QUOTE (Kier @ Oct 27 2009, 09:58 PM)

QUOTE

My life as 'suspect A'

The 'domestic extremist' label brings with it police harassment � from violent arrest to being photographed breastfeeding

� � � � � o Emily Apple
� � � � � o guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 27 October 2009 18.30 GMT

I am suspect A on the spotter card printed by the Guardian, and I am, in the eyes of the police force, a "domestic extremist".

The Guardian

These cards seem to date from around 2005.

QUOTE

"I'm pretty sure they got my photograph from the G8 in Gleneagles when we took 200 clown activists up there.

Source

Remember that some of the dead from 7/7 were known to have marched against the UK's involvement in wars in the Middle East. It would be interesting to know if any of them were singled out as politically unacceptable to the police.

Bridget

Posted: Nov 6 2009, 10:11 AM

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QUOTE

Report calls for antisocial behaviour to be treated as criminal

Government adviser Sara Payne recommends justice system be reworked to focus more closely on victims

* Peter Walker
* guardian.co.uk, Thursday 5 November 2009 11.35 GMT

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Sara Payne has called for antisocial behaviour to be treated as a crime.

Antisocial behaviour should be increasingly treated as a criminal rather than civil matter, a report by the crime campaigner turned government adviser Sara Payne recommended today.

The document said the wider justice system should be reworked to focus more closely on victims.

It follows cases such as that of Fiona Pilkington, who killed herself and her disabled daughter after suffering years of abuse from local youths, during which no criminal charges were brought.

Payne's report said police and local authorities should decide which forms of antisocial behaviour ought to be routinely treated as criminal.

Victims of all antisocial behaviour should have access to the same network of support available to those whose cases were being dealt with in the criminal courts, it added.

Payne � who campaigned for changes to the law on information about paedophiles living in communities after her eight-year-old daughter, Sarah, was abducted and murdered by a released sex offender in 2000 � was made "victims' champion" by the government at the beginning of this year.

The one-year independent advisory role saw her meet victims, witnesses and frontline staff before drawing up the 49-page Redefining Justice report, which will be used to help amend the coroners and justice bill currently going through parliament.

Speaking to reporters today, Payne said she was seeking a fundamental readjustment of the criminal justice system so it assessed the total impact a crime had on its victims rather than what classification of crime had been carried out.

"We need to be treating victims with the respect that they deserve, and asking what justice would be for them," she added.

Victims were particularly likely to be failed when they faced what was classified as antisocial behaviour and was therefore dealt with by council officials rather than police, she warned.

"When a crime has been carried out, it should be treated as a crime," she said.

The report also recommended that defendants lose the right to a reduced sentence if they pleaded guilty on the day a trial began rather than earlier in the process.

It said prosecution and defence lawyers should face penalties if they were not ready to begin a trial on time.

And it called for sentencing to be made clearer both in its terminology and in having the process of parole and sentence reductions explained properly.

"I want everyone � victims, witnesses, defendants � to walk out of court very clear about what time will be served," Payne said.

"I think that, by changing the way we look at victims, we change the justice system right through."

Jack Straw, who as the justice secretary was one of the ministers who appointed Payne, welcomed the report and said the government was trying to improve services for crime victims.

"We are proud of what we have achieved, but realise there is more work to be done � and Sara Payne's recommendations will help us do this," he said.

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