Category Archives: News

John Catt challenges police surveillance

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On 9th February 2012 John Catt, a campaigner against arms dealers EDO MBM Technology Ltd in Brighton, a subsidiary of American arms company ITT Exelis Inc, brought a case in the high court over the retention of data by the National Public Order Intelligence Unit (NPOIU) on the National Domestic Extremist Database.

During the case Jeremy Johnson, lawyer for the Metropolitan Police and ACPO, said that 261 individuals details were stored on the database because of their connections to Smash EDO. Continue reading →

RBS blockaders found not guilty

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During Smash EDO’s Hammertime demonstration in 2010 two people were arrested for gluing themseves to the doors of the Royal Bank of Scotland over its investments in ITT and its loan services to the arms trade. They were found not guilty at Brighton Magistrates Court last week.

Freedom to Protest court case – 8/2/2012

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On the 8th February 2012 Chris Osmond was in court for criminal damage for allegedly tapping the fence of EDO with a rock during a demonstration.

A solidarity demonstration was held outside the court

The charges against Chris are clearly politically motivated. The trial has been running for fifteen months with the Crown Prosecution Service never yet specifying the amount of damage caused.

The defence made an application too dismiss on the grounds of abuse of process. This was because the CPS had originally dropped the case due to ‘insufficient evidence’ and then restarted the prosecution five months later.

During his evidence Chris branded the proceedings “Kafkaesque”

The district Judge will give a judgement on the abuse of process argument by the 20th February.