On 21 October, armed Metropolitan police officer Martyn Blake was acquitted of murdering unarmed black man Chris Kaba in September 2022. After a three-week trial, which focused on the final moments of Kaba’s life, the jury took under three hours to reach the verdict.
An initial police notification published after Kaba’s murder stated that specialist firearms officers had been ‘in pursuit of a suspect vehicle’, which led to police cars ramming the vehicle Kaba was driving, boxing him in. Without making any attempts to identify Kaba, Blake fired a single shot through his windscreen in an execution-style killing. The entire incident lasted just 13 seconds.
During the trial, Blake attempted to justify the murder by claiming his colleagues’ lives were at risk because Kaba attempted to escape in the car he was driving. However, the prosecution revealed that Kaba’s vehicle never exceeded 12mph and, when questioned in court, Blake was unable to identify any officers in immediate danger.
Kaba’s murder is the latest in a long line of deaths at the hands of the British state. According to a report published by Inquest, since 1990 there have been 1,906 deaths following police custody or contact in England and Wales, often due to brutality and racism. In that period only one on-duty officer has been found guilty of manslaughter: Benjamin Monk who tasered Dalian Atkinson and kicked him in the head twice in 2016. Other criminal charges have been brought against officers following deaths in custody such as misconduct in public office, but most have led to acquittals.
Two days after Blake’s acquittal, the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) published a fact sheet on Kaba’s murder and the trial which explained that they will now ‘review whether disciplinary proceedings remain appropriate’, referring to a gross misconduct inquiry that was opened in 2022 but adjourned while criminal proceedings took place. The IOPC’s reluctance to pursue disciplinary action lays bare its role as a complicit tool of the state that is designed to protect police officers from accountability.
While putting Blake on trial was a victory in one sense for those campaigning for justice, it also tied the campaign to the outcome of the legal proceedings, leading it away from the possibility of more radical or direct protest. The acquittal and gross misconduct inquiry are all part of an endlessly repeated cycle that leaves families and communities hoping in vain that they can get justice from the legal system. The system will never be on the side of the working class.
British media – racist media
The day after the verdict, a gagging order that prevented the press from reporting on Chris Kaba’s criminal record was lifted. The racist British media immediately jumped at the chance to attack his character.
The Telegraph published an article headlined ‘Chris Kaba was a violent gangster who gunned down rival days before he was killed’. The Daily Mail detailed his criminal record – dating back to when he was 13. The Times commented ‘most black citizens recognise this dead gang member as their worst nightmare’. For good measure, countless articles attacking Chris Kaba’s character were plastered on practically every social media platform. These articles were written to justify giving impunity to killer officers. A criminal record does not justify an unarmed person being murdered by the state.
Racist police attack our democratic rights
The police have used this opportunity to attack criminal prosecutions, inquiries and misconduct proceedings. While ineffective, these processes are ostensibly meant to hold the police to account and protect our rights. The Guardian has revealed that the National Police Chiefs’ Council has submitted proposals to the government that would give officers under investigation for any use of force greater protections. They include:
- Making it harder for the Crown Prosecution Service to prosecute police officers by making them prove that the officer deviated from their training or approved guidelines.
- Increasing the standard of proof required for an inquest verdict of unlawful killing from balance of probabilities to beyond reasonable doubt.
- Making it harder to disprove claims of self-defence in misconduct inquiries.
- ‘Greater protections’ for police drivers who injure people or crash. IOPC figures for 2023/24 show that 32 people in England and Wales have been killed in crashes with police vehicles.
Similar calls have been voiced by Metropolitan Police chief Mark Rowley while Home Secretary Yvette Cooper has announced that all officers involved in shootings will remain anonymous. The Labour government, keen to build its ‘tough on crime’ credentials, is likely to grant more concessions to the police. This will amount to enhancing the police’s power to harass, maim and kill the working class with impunity – it is undoubtedly black people who will suffer the most.
When do we fight back?
The acquittal of Martyn Blake and the attack on our democratic rights have once again demonstrated that there can be no justice for the working class, particularly black people, under bourgeois rule. Since 1990, 83 people have been shot dead by the police, 33 by the Metropolitan Police. We have seen Kaba’s story play out countless times, from Jean Charles de Menezes in 2005 to Mark Duggan in 2011, armed police combine escalatory tactics and shoot-to-kill policies to murder someone, the victim’s character is attacked by the press, the police close ranks and families are given the run-around through inquiries and court proceedings only to ultimately be denied justice.
Recent instances of police brutality have led to spontaneous outbursts of anger by the working class. In July 2024, the predominantly Roma and Asian community in Harehills, Leeds, fought the police on the streets after four children were dragged from their home and taken into care. That same month, protests were held outside Rochdale police station after a video of a police officer kicking a handcuffed Asian man in the head at Manchester Airport went viral. The most oppressed sections of the working class instinctively understand that the police are their enemy and that justice can only be won by fighting for it on the streets, not by appealing to a system that exists to enforce class rule.
The increasing impunity and brutality of the police will inevitably draw the most oppressed sections of the working class into struggle. This struggle must confront the racist British state and the capitalist system it protects. That is how justice will be achieved for Chris Kaba and the countless people who have been murdered by the state.
Destinie Sanchez and Kotsai Sigauke
