For the second time this year, "squatters leaders" have been COlvicted to Conspiracy to Contravene the Forcible Entries Act of 1429. Occupiers of disused army property at Wykeham Terrace, Brighton and their adherents (some were questioned by the police..6 were charged.
All were found guilty: Michael Mountford got 18 months and months suspended sentence brought into effect, which equals two and a half years in all. Anthon Ballerini got Borstal. Paul Miles: months: Michael Mitchell: 15 months; Michael O'Niell: months suspended and Michael Christmas was put on bation for two years.
Michael Mountford was "the most culpable and most responsible for the people on the squat" (i.e. more guilty than the others.) The judge also thought that the squat was a "direct challenge to the civil authorities" and that it was a "provocation action in the hope of starting civil strife..in the guise of helping the homeless.
The squatters trial was the second of its kind in the same court in less than six months; it was a local event and the jury would have read a good deal in the reactionary local press about it. Of course some of accused were anarchists...which is an admission of guilt before a verdict is even reached.
The most useful evidence of the trial was from a Special Branch member, who in the guise of helping the homeless, made it his business to go into the squat and befriend its political supporters, (the more extreme the better). He then initiated many of the so-called defence Whose com Rise Halloren kind of dissent, lawful or unlawful.
Cambridge with its firmly-established place in bourgeois mythology, was an ideal place to extract the maximum publicity for a show trial. But in many ways, it was the wrong demonstration to choose, and the countless examples of contradictions in police and prosecution testimony (chronicled at length and in vain by the defence) bear witness to the difficulty which the prosecution had in preparing the case The result, of course, is that of the nineteen who originally appeared in Cambridge Magistrates Court, all but seven are now at liberty. But the crucial fact is that in seven cases they made the charges stick.
There is no doubt that there is rejoicing in the Junta's offices in Athens. After the trial at Hertford the official Junta paper 'Nea Politeia' said: 'British justice sets an crample of respect for civilised tradition", and went on to thank Melford Stevenson for extracting retribution for the wickedness committed last February against an As the level of repression in Britain escalates, the particular repression of the black community is becoming more concentrated. Shortage of space allows us only to reproduce excerpts from two of the reports of specific police provocations that have reached the Dwarf office in the last few weeks. The tactics used by the authorities in these cases seem to show the following general tendencies:
The attacks explore the political character of black militancy. The provocations probe the strength of the black response, the organization of its defence, and the depth of its solidarity. 2. They isolate the black leadership. Spokesmen are removed either physically (jail) or discredited in the press, through scare campaigns involving 'black power". 3. They strengthen the hands of the Uncle Tom's. Men like Pitt, Dipak Nandy, etc. are promoted as representatives of the black movement, as the real leaders are removed or gagged. 4. They raise the spectre of black power for whites. Thus class division is fostered, long before the slogan can have any real meaning in Britain The British ruling class is not racist in the sense that the landowning aristocracy southern U.S. states is racist. But rather it uses racialism when it considers it expedient for its political purposes. Thus white workers faced with redundancies can duped by a Powellite promoting black workers as scapegoats. At the same time, the pawns used by the ruling class are genuinely racist, for «example policeman such as Pulley. He is nOW he centre of a minor controversy in Notting Hill, but was denounced over a year ago in the Dwarf. Eyewitness reports of the work of Pulley's colleagues form the basis of the following accounts.
The latest provocation occurred on August 9th during a demonstration in Notting Hill to OTOLE. against the onstant police raids of the Mangrove restaurant. Our reporter, the Education Officer Indian Marxist-Leninist Association, writes: About two hundred demonstrators, mostly Caribbeans with a fair sprinkling of Englishmen and Indians, followed a circuitous route through those streets with a high density of blacks past the infamous Notting Dale and Notting Hill police stations. After doging. a close police escort for a few minutes by crossing over a footbridge, the marchers ran into trouble in Portnall Road. A brother holding up slogans such as "Thugs in uniform - Out" and "Skinheads in Blue" was shoved hard into the crowd, and then seconds a hundred demonstrators were fighting with the police and their reinforcements. (There were several hundred of them, bottled up waiting in streets hours.). Many were arrested, and cases of individal brutality were reported, e.g. "six policemen beating up a ten-year old Caribbean boy" or a white photographer "being viciously punched in the face and stomach by a policeman"
Later, a second incident was sparked off 'by plain clothes policeman attempting to seize a banner from a black sister. A brother went to her defence, and fury of the police was again unleashed. After about twenty minutes of struggle, marchers filed individually to the Mangrove, followed by eight police coaches. It was raided later.
Evidence was collected of more brutality in the police coaches, after the arrests. One black sister was beaten on the head with a large piece of Cannabis, while the policeman shouted This is for you darling". When another sister told him to leave her alone, a policeman behind her told her to keep quiet, and put a half-nelson on her while her left hand was being bent continuouslyshe later received hospital treatment for a sprained wrist." Inside the police stations hower (Harrow Rd. and Earls Court) only one brother was badly beaten'.
The earlier incident on 27th July took place in the Market Street Fun Fair Three black kids (a girl 15 and two brothers 17 and 18) were arrested and taken to the Caledonian Rd police station This was the prelude to our second documented case of deliberate provocation.
The girl's 17 year old boyfriend rushed to the Black House, Holloway Rd, to collect Michael X. He agreed to come down and investigate, bringing with him his solicitor and a journalist The three asked to see one of the prisoners, but were told that he still hadn't been charged, and they'd have to wait. Black youths started turning up at the station as news of the incident spread. By 11pm there were about seventy of them, filling the waiting room and narrow corridor. Our reporter describes what happened: A door along the passage opened and about thirty five police officers and two noisy Alsatian dogs appeared. The black crowd became rigid The police asked them to leave. One black youth reorted that "We came to see that our brothers and sisters treated fairly."
*The police and dogs then surgedforward, one officer shouting at the crowd "Get out, get out" The crown remained firm. Meanwhile the Caledonian station radioed for reinforcements from nearby police stations." As the youths were pushed back, a journalist describing the scene into a tape recorder was arrested then others. Inside the police station, where the arrested were held, a sixteen year old schoolboy kicked and punched by a police officer, then thrown into a cell. The boy screamed as he landed on the hard concrete surface.
Eleven were arrested. They were granted bail at three o'clock in the morning. Next morning in court they were charged with anything from obstruction assaulting a police officer, and were remanded on bail till the 7th and 14th October. That afternoon a conference of black militants was called where they reached an agreement for more active cooperation in the future The authorities have learnt that attacks on diverse collective associations such as students can be successful in defeating and demoralising militant political organisation. They may find with their attacks on the Blacks however that the opposite will happen. The 'premature assaults will only build solidarity and militancy within already embattled communities. Special Reporter