PRESS GANGED

AS COPS USE JOURNALISTS FOR EVIDENCE GATHERING

Earlier this week Sussex Police forced Brighton’s local rag The Argus to hand over footage of the Brighton Mayday demo (see SchNEWS 675). Pushing a ‘special procedure production order’ through Lewes Crown Court, under section 9 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, the police got the courts to grant an order for “all media containing moving and/or still images...published and unpublished of the march/procession/assembly/demonstration and subsequent disturbances which took place in Brighton, East Sussex on May 4, 2009.”

After crossing the hurdle of their own stupidity (the police had to resubmit their application to the courts as they’d made crucial mistakes in their original submission), Sussex’s boys in blue found it fairly easy to persuade the judges that it was necessary to dump on journalistic integrity from a great height in order to find the culprits responsible for kicking over some bins and redecorating the front of McDonalds and Barclay’s.

According to the legal team at Newsquest (The Argus’ dark overlords) it’s ‘fairly standard’ for the police to request/demand/threaten footage and information from journalists, with 700 demands like this made every year. What’s different about this case is that, as anyone who was at the Mayday demo (or saw it on telly) will know, the entire event from beginning to end was already filmed by FIT cops and took place in some of the most CCTV’d areas of the UK. Presumably, the police want to use The Argus’ footage to identify protesters. In other words, force the media into operating as a conscripted FIT team.

We spoke to Argus crime reporter Ben Parsons about the implications for both the press and protesters of this latest police boot stamping on the fragile neck of civil liberties. Parsons said:

“It puts us in a difficult position. We act in a spirit of co-operation but not collaboration with the police. The line we (Argus/Newsquest) take is that we won’t just hand stuff over because they ask for it, they have to go through the formal legal process. We don’t send our cameramen out to act as extra eyes for the police. It’s not how we see our role, we’re not data gathering source for the police.”


The EDO decommissioners who targeted the Brighton-based arms factory back in January (See SchNEWS 663) have had their court case adjourned until May 17th 2010, due to delays in finding legal aid and the prosecution’s seeming reluctance to provide evidence.

Despite this, the planned week of solidarity events is going ahead during 17th - 26th of October. The line-up includes:

* Sat 17th - Decommissioners solidarity demo in Bristol. Meeting opposite Hippodrome at 2pm

* Launch demo of Target Brimar, Manchester see http://targetbrimar.org.uk

* Mon 19th - Rally outside Brighton Town Hall 12 noon-2pm calling on Brighton and Hove Council to condemn EDO.

* Thurs 22nd - Rally 12noon-2pm outside the Foreign Office, London, demanding an end of arms exports to Israel.

* Fri 23rd – Bass Not Bombs benefit gig, Bristol, featuring Lowkey, Ironside, Dub Revolution and more.

For more see www.smashedo.org.uk