On 22 February, after a six-week trial, all four defendants charged following the November 2006 Harmondsworth Immigration Removal Centre (IRC) uprising were acquitted of conspiring to commit violent disorder or criminal damage and various charges of damaging property. (Two had earlier pleaded guilty to specific acts of minor criminal damage.) The verdict was a great victory against the inhumane system of immigration detention and a positive result for all those who struggle and campaign against it. It was, however, hardly justice for the Harmondsworth Four, who, already detained at the time of the protest, had spent over a year on remand in criminal prisons and after the trial were redetained under immigration law.
The four men, two Russians, a Palestinian and an Egyptian, appear to have been picked almost at random by the British state to face a highly political prosecution in revenge for the uprising that wrecked Harmondsworth. They were accused of spending weeks plotting ‘widespread disorder and destruction’. The ‘evidence’ for this came largely from a detainee witness for the prosecution, who is said to have bartered his testimony for permission to work in Britain.
In reality the uprising was a spontaneous protest in response to cumulative grievances, brought to a head by the publication of the Chief Inspector of Prisons’ report into conditions at the detention centre on the same day that a Brazilian detainee was violently restrained by officers.
Much of what actually happened during the protest was accepted by both sides, but many actions which the prosecution tried to label as criminal behaviour were in fact the prisoners defending themselves when staff responded to the revolt by locking detainees into their rooms while parts of the IRC were on fire, and shutting others out on the yard in the cold. Detainees refused to be locked in and broke windows to allow fresh air in or to pass water into those who could not get out.
One Detention Custody Officer (DCO) gave evidence that one of the defendants was red-faced and waving his arms around in an inciting manner, but, when shown CCTV footage, admitted she was wrong and the defendant was seemingly joking around. Another DCO referred to detainees in the courtyard as: ‘Africans drumming on bins, doing war-dance’.
The four defendants were grilled by the prosecution barrister and repeatedly accused of organising against the system. In his summing up the prosecutor quoted the two Russian defendants as saying they were treated worse than dogs in kennels, and referred to their letter to FRFI (see http: //www.revolutionarycommunist.org/racism/letter_harm4.html), saying ‘in 2007 they wrote a letter still complaining about detention and the treatment…no doubt they spent their long and boring days complaining and plotting…’
The jury was out for a week and could not agree on the verdict. Although the judge had directed that this was ‘not a political trial’ and the jury’s views on immigration detention were irrelevant, there was clearly plenty to deliberate on. Finally the jury
returned a majority verdict that all four were not guilty.
As FRFI goes to press the Harmondsworth Four remain imprisoned. Three of them now face renewed legal battles against deportation. Ironically the fourth man had already made clear before the protest that he was not contesting his deportation and was just keen to leave.
The Support the Harmondsworth Four campaign was set up in November 2007 and FRFI has participated actively in it, together with Barbed-Wire Britain, Campaign against Racism and Fascism, London No Borders and the Payday Men’s Network. The campaign demonstrated outside the court each Monday and had an observer in court almost every day of the trial. It also picketed Kalyx, the private contractor that runs Harmondsworth, on the day of the verdict. The campaign continues to visit and support the prisoners and can be contacted at: [email protected]
Donations towards financial support for the detainees can be paid into No Borders London’s bank account (ref: 65252615; sort code; 08-92-99) or cheques payable to No Borders London sent via FRFI.
Nicki Jameson
FRFI 202 April 2008 / May 2008
