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news, UK

Block party policing is racist: Covid laws excuse by riot police to terrorise London estates


Updated 14:38 BST

Black community leaders on the ground in London say an uprising is inevitable if police and their political masters continue with their oppressive policing of young black people at block party gatherings

A series of incidents across London are seeing tensions between the community and the police boils over.

One law for Black youth, another for middle-class white people

This comes against the background of mounting concern about the racist nature of the contrast between how black youth are dealt with in the Covid pandemic as opposed to white sunbathers on beaches, or mostly white people gathering in large numbers in cramped conditions in and around pubs, such as in Soho Square in London’s West End yesterday.

In those locations there is not a policeman to be seen but as soon as black youth organise their own cheaper forms of entertainment there’s a visit from the Metropolitan police’s Tactical Support Group (riot police).

In addition to the panoply of stop and search laws the police already use to harass black people – such as under PACE, Section 60 and anti-terrorism legislation, there is a new weapon in their locker: the Covid Act.

This was made clear not long into the pandemic when black people were soon shown to be disproportionately more likely to be stopped and fined by the police.

“There’s an explosion coming if the police carry on like this with the TSG”

Ken Hinds

Ken Hinds, who runs a police monitoring group based in Tottenham, north London told BLMM: “Why don’t they come and talk to the community and the elders so we can supervise our own events instead of sending in riot police?”

“There’s an explosion coming if the police carry on like this with the TSG [Tactical Support Group].”

The rising tension has seen young people push back against police intimidation and wanton violence.

Block party clampdown: a “general anti-police conflagration” coming?

BLM activist Gary McFarlane echoed those sentiments: “After weeks of being told by the Tory politicians and others who should know better, that there was nothing to be fighting about here in the UK concerning racism – we see on display in this racist policing of block parties the full extent of the institutional racism of the police, and the government and politicians who encourage them.

“This comes after numerous cases of police racist violence and profiling, such as around the death of Nicole Smallman and Bibaa Henry.

“Then there’s the appalling treatment of Andrew Boateng and his son and the most recent outrage that has just come to light of Ryan Colaço, who has been repeatedly stopped by racist police -– one time after coming back from a Channel 4 interview about police harassment. Enough is enough.”

McFarlane continued: “The Met should know that more of this brutal discriminatory policing will see localised fight backs turn into a general anti-police conflagration across London. Is that what they really want?”

BLM fuels Black youth fightback

After months of being confined in flats with no gardens and with little money, the Black Lives Matter movement has given black (and white) working-class youth greater confidence to challenge racist policing practices.

Parties have been held in Streatham, Brixton, Tottenham, Kensal Town to name just a few areas of London, where videos of riot police have gone viral.

Police running riot on an estate in Hammersmith last night

However, if you are a middle class white person partying and spending £5 on a pint of beer in Soho in crowded conditions that break all Covid social-distancing rules, that’s just fine. Not a cop in sight.

https://twitter.com/wailq/status/1279309134068842496?s=21
From Michael in Croydon – This is how the police shut down block parties at majority working class black estates. But it’s ok for everyone to be out on the piss at pubs all weekend.
https://twitter.com/christielinford/status/1279464555547168768?s=21
Former Olympic sprint gold medalist takes Met police to task. The cops are bent on stoking an uprising. 

Raise your voice against the criminalisation of Black youth

Make a complaint to the Mayor’s Office For Policing and Crime (MOPAC)

Complain direct to the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) and Independent for Police Conduct (IOPC):

MPS 
Directorate of Professional Standards 
Complaints Support Team
22nd Floor, Empress State Building
Lillie Road
London
SW6 1TR

IOPC
Independent Office for Police Conduct
PO Box 473
Sale
M33 0BW

This story will be updated throughout the day

action

North London says no to Tasers, scrap Section 60 stop and search

Three hundred people came to Turnpike Lane today to protest against the use of Tasers by police and draconian Section 60 stop and search laws.

The protest was organised by Haringey Stand Up To Racism and supported by local Black Lives Matter groups.

Speakers included deputy leader of Haringey Council Seema Chandwani, and Andrew Boateng who’s case was recently reported by the national media after he was stopped with his son and handcuffed while on a charity ride for a community-police relations charity.

The cases of two black men (Millard Scott and Jordan Walker-Brown) tasered by police in Tottenham have come to light in recent weeks.

This follows incidents in the North, particularly in Manchester where Desmond Ziggy Mombeyarara was tasered while holding his 5-year-old child.

A rising number of cases are being recorded as police use Tasers as an offensive weapon, and not for defence as originally intended.

Section 60 is increasingly being used by police to stop and search black youth without having to give a reason. Although most stops are still under PACE (Police and Criminal Evidence Act), the number is falling because of campaigning against it.

In response however, police are routinely turning to the more severe public order legislation that provides police with more draconian powers.

At the request of senior officers, entire boroughs – often several at the same time – can be put under section 60 and any individual stopped and searched.

These laws are being abused to widen the oppressive overpolicing of black communities – seen most recently in the ongoing unnecessary use of force to shut down block and street parties in London and elsewhere, while allowing sunbathers to congregate in huge numbers unmolested by the authorities.

Protesting at Ducketts Common, Turnpike Lane on 4th July 2020. Pic credits: Dave Gilchrist
Andrew Boateng speaks out about the brutal racial profiling of himself and his 13-year-old son Hugo, who was handcuffed and left bruised and traumatised after the encounter with police
art and culture

Poetry: In memory. x

Your strength is your weakness
Your poise a disgrace
Your indifference, no mercy
As you knelt by his face

Your hand in your pocket
With a casual pose
Your arrogant distaste
That so few of us knows

Your power misused
And your status no more
Your act of no mercy
Now we close your door

How could you not care
Your image now world wide
How could you murder the innocent
We are not on your side

You bring shame to our homes
You bring shame on your own
How could you not hear him
As he lay there and moaned

What hatred you harbour
In your position of power
This cannot continue
It is the day, it is the hour

For unite we all must
Against racism unpure
Now is the time
Now we must be sure

Each voice must be heard
Each human, black or white
This must end, this must finish
Not another day, or another night

So for now, we all pray
That never again
Will discrimination win
And cause so much widespread pain

Lolly
2020

art and culture

Poetry: Who Killed George Floyd by Trevor Homer

Who was it killed George Floyd?

Not I said the cop, I’m just employed

to do a job, and felt annoyed that

Just because he used his weight

To crush his windpipe and suffocate him

On the street in broad daylight, while 3 more officers

Held him down, like in so many other towns.

I only acted in self-defence,

to save the white folk from attack, he just happens to be
black.

You know our policy – Aim to Kill

He shouldn’t have passed that dollar bill.

Who was it killed George Floyd?

It wasn’t I said the passer by.

I pay my tax like all the rest,

And want the cops to keep me safe.

I just stopped to take a look,

I always do things by the book.

He must have done something wrong,

For them to hold him down so long,

I walked away when I heard him shout,

‘I can’t breathe, please let me out’!

Who was it killed George Floyd?

Not I said the teacher who taught him well

In practise for his living hell.

He wouldn’t listen to me at all

However much I made him crawl.

You might say it was neglect, but

He never showed me any respect.

Always expected to finish last,

Always put at the back of class.

I just kept him off the street,

Until his time came to leave.

There’s plenty more where he came from,

Mother’s grieving for another son.

You can say life’s unfair, but don’t blame me,

I wasn’t there.

Who was it killed George Floyd?

Not I said the man at the Labour exchange,

Even though he was unemployed.

I tried my best to arrange a job,

Sure, it was 12 hours a day that

Didn’t even cover rent.

By the time you’re paid the money’s spent.

It doesn’t matter what you do,

You’ll find his kind are never content.

I’m not saying I’m better than him,

But it helps to have white skin.

‘Cos every time he gets in line,

There’s a million others to stand behind.

Who was it killed George Floyd?

Not I said the populist journalist

I just tell it like it is.

I listen to what the people say,

Then turn it ‘round the other way.

I check the facts with utmost rigour,

Then make it sound like propaganda.

You can’t deny the facts are true,

It’s just a different point of view.

Ask my editor, he agrees,

It’s all about the sale of copies.

Who was it killed George Floyd?

Not I said the President from his lair

But then, I don’t really care.

Talking to the howling faithful,

Telling them they should be grateful

Living in the land of plenty,

With half the country’s pockets empty.

Using them to take the blame

And make America great again.

To be the first, to be the best,

To fuel the flames of racial unrest,

With cops who acts as judge and jury,

His ‘Land of the Brave – Home of the Free.’

Trevor Homer / June 1st 2020

deaths, news

Justice for Darren Cumberbatch – Jail killer police!

by David Kersey, pictures by Geoff Dexter

Over 350 people attended a march in Nuneaton, Warwickshire yesterday, Saturday, to protest for justice for Darren Cumberbatch from Coventry.

Darren died following an incident with Warwickshire police on 10 July.

Witnesses and family have alleged that he was assaulted and tasered by the police that evening. Darren was placed in intensive care at George Eliot Hospital, Nuneaton, after being “dearrested” by the police.

He remained in a coma and died on 19 July.

Campaigners marched from Nuneaton railway station to the McIntyre House hostel where Darren had been staying. Candles were lit and flowers left in tribute at the hostel entrance.

The march then moved on to the police headquarters in the town.

Campaigners demanded the immediate suspension of the police officers involved and suspension of the use of tasers.

The march followed an angry and determined public meeting attended by over 200 people in Coventry last Wednesday.

Speakers on Saturday included Darren’s family, community activist Rev Desmond Jaddoo and witnesses from the hostel where Darren was interrogated by police on the night he ended up in a coma.

The march was led by Darren’s family and supported by his many friends as well as community activists and trade unionists from Coventry and beyond.

Family members gave solidarity greetings to the families of Rashan Charles and Edson Da Costa.

Desmond Jaddoo stated to big cheers, “We have brought one of the main roads in Nuneaton to a standstill. No one gets through, in the name of Darren Cumberbatch. We want Justice for Darren.”

Carla, Darren’s sister, said, “Numbers is power. I am going to make my voice heard in the name of my brother.”

Visit www.facebook.com/Justice4Daz/ to support the campaign.

 

Thanks to Socialist Worker

https://socialistworker.co.uk/art/45061/We+will+fight+for+justice+for+Darren+Cumberbatch

action

Justice for Théo – Protest on Friday 17th February 6pm, French Embassy

Protest on Friday 17th February 6pm, French Embassy
‎58 Knightsbridge, London, SW1X 7JT
Albert Gate, opposite Kuwaiti embassy. Nearest tube is Knightsbridge (Piccadilly line).

Justice For Théo #justicepourtheo

Théo, a 22-year-old youth worker, was arrested last week in Aulnay-sous-Bois in the northern suburbs of Paris and anally raped by racist French police.

A police investigation claims that Théo was ‘accidentally’ assaulted and that there was ‘insufficient evidence’ to support the allegations made by the victim against the police officers involved, despite the video evidence and injuries suffered.

The French police brutalise people of African and Arab descent on a daily basis and with impunity. This must not stand.

As France enters its eighth day of protests, we call for the jailing of the police officers and justice for Théo and all the other victims of France’s racist police and an end to the cover-ups by the French state.

We also call for an urgent investigation into the extent of Fascist infiltration of French police.

Half of the police are thought to vote for Le Pen’s Fascist Front Nationale. The electoral successes of the FN and its support base among police is an indication of how and deep and widespread racism is in French society. Le Pen’s Islamophobia and racism, and that of the state itself, has emboldened the police in their persecution of minorities.

Shockingly, the French state does not collect any information on the extent of racist discrimination in employment, education, housing and policing – it justifies this in the name of Republican equality and the EU does nothing about it. Institutional racism against Muslims and ethnic minorities is rampant.

Brigade Anti-Negrophobie has been leading the protests in Aulnay-sous-Bois and elsewhere. A representative of the organisation will be speaking at the anti-Trump Summit at Friends Meeting House, Euston on Saturday 18th February.

Join Friday’s protest, 6.00pm at the French embassy
Justice For Theo #justicepourtheo
No justice, No peace
Smash the Front Nationale
Tell the French state that Black Lives Matter!
Called by Stand Up To Racism, Black Lives Matter Movement and Silence is Violence

action

#justicepourtheo – jail racist French police rapists

The French police’s rape of Theo (his full name hasn’t been released yet) has unleashed a wave of protests in France. Four police officers have been charged with assault and one with rape.

Unfortunately in racist France this is no guarantee that justice will be done. This assault is a graphic illustration of the daily racist police brutality inflicted on Black and Arab minorities in France.

The rise of the fascist Le Pen shows the depths of racism in the country, especially towards people from a Muslim background.

France likes to project to the world a face of equality and freedom, but for Africans and Arabs the story is rather different.

The attack on Theo is a declaration of war. All power to the protesters and rioters fighting back.

On Saturday Silence is Violence held a protest at the French embassy, supported by BLMM, in solidarity with Theo.

No justice, no peace.