FRFI 176 December 2003 / January 2004
After 17 years of frame-up, criminalisation and campaigning, Winston Silcott has been released from prison. It is vital that Winston’s story is not written off as a personal struggle to be forgotten with his release. It holds important lessons about how the state will repress black and working class resistance and criminalise individuals to intimidate the movement, and about the importance of unified and principled defence campaigns to demand justice. The Revolutionary Communist Group was involved with the struggle, both for Winston and the community, from the beginning.
On 6 October 1985, an uprising broke out on Broadwater Farm housing estate in Tottenham, north London, after a mother, Cynthia Jarrett, died during a violent police raid on her home the previous day. The uprising was one of several to erupt in inner-city communities during that year in response to police brutality and poverty. Only the previous week, Cherry Groce had been shot in the back and paralysed in a police raid on her home in Brixton, south London. During the uprising in Tottenham, PC Blakelock was killed. Winston Silcott, who was known as an opponent of racist stop-and-search tactics, was quickly lined up by the police to take the blame for the killing.
As the ashes smouldered, the police laid siege and occupied the estate for two months, in riot gear, with police dogs, helicopters and heavy surveillance day in, day out. Doors were smashed open with pickaxes, homes raided and hundreds of people, including young teenagers, were rounded up for interrogation for days on end, deprived of sleep, clothing and food, threatened and racially and sexually abused by police officers. Several of those arrested were pressured into false confessions naming Winston as guilty of killing the police officer. By February 1986, there had been 210 arrests, but half of those resulted in no charge at all.
Winston Silcott, Engin Raghip and Mark Braithwaite were charged with the murder of PC Blakelock. They were pronounced guilty by the media, before being convicted on fabricated evidence in a trial condemned as unfair by Amnesty International. A campaign for the release of the Tottenham Three was established and Winston’s family and his friend, Delroy Lindo, set up the Winston Silcott Defence Campaign.
Finally, in an appeal in 1991, the Tottenham Three had their murder convictions overturned and were awarded compensation for wrongful imprisonment. Winston, however, was kept in prison for the killing of Anthony Smith, which he has always maintained was self-defence. At the time of the Broadwater Farm uprising, Winston was on bail, awaiting trial on this charge, clearly not considered a risk to society. However, this pending court case was used by the racist British media to criminalise Winston. It is unlikely that Winston would have served so much time for the killing of Anthony Smith had he not been convicted for murdering a police officer, even though that conviction was overturned.
FRFI spoke to Winston about his struggle and his release.
FRFI: Do you see your release as a victory?
Winston Silcott: I don’t see it as a victory. The only victory would have been if they had dealt with both cases. You can’t entangle both cases and then deal with them as separate entities. Put it this way, if it wasn’t for the Smith case, no way would the police have been able to fabricate evidence against me and get away with it. They took over a thousand photographs on the night, no eyewitness evidence, no forensic evidence. The so-called evidence that they used couldn’t convict someone in the majority of countries across the world. They were so sure they would get the conviction, because I was out on bail on the other case. And the press behaved with typical racist hysteria.
Why should people join community campaigns for justice?
People can make a difference. There have been a lot of people who have had individual victories campaigning for things that they believe in or for what is right, but the majority of people seem to cave in and a lot of people give up the fight. That’s the truth. The system puts a lot of stumbling blocks in the way to prevent you moving forward or receiving justice. They know more people give up than fight on. They wear you down. The more people that get involved in campaigns, the less confidence for the system because it knows that there is a positive force to be reckoned with. If they can isolate you as individuals it makes their fight easier. The whole system works together, starting with the police, the police get backing from the media, the criminal justice system, then you’ve got parliament, they all back each other up.
Do you have a message for prisoners?
All I say is to stay strong and if you have a fight, be steadfast and don’t give up. What happened to me is nothing new. It has been there for a long time and the system has the patience, the manpower and the resources to play people down. But if people stick to their guns, they will get there in the end.
Do you have a message for our readers?
Years ago I know that FRFI had problems getting the newspaper in to prison. I ask you if you still have problems and you say yes – so nothing has really changed. The prison system is always saying that it is more open and more people-friendly, more willing to be under scrutiny. But all you get is certain officers, they see the paper and are of a different political persuasion and they take it upon themselves to say we are not letting this paper in. Another reason why prison doesn’t like FRFI is that you highlight certain prisoners’ struggles or what happened in certain prisons and they are anti the paper because you are exposing them and they don’t want prisoners knowing what is happening in other prisons.
Finally, I would like to thank FRFI for the support you have given me over the years.
