Police
attempting to bluff campaigners over HLS related emails
It has come to our attention
that the police working on behalf of the customers of HLS who have taken out
injunctions against protests are over stretching themselves in their
interpretations of its terms and attempting to harass activists on behalf of
their masters. This article gives you the information to unmask their tricks
and keep yourself safe from them.
Please read all of it, as it is not hard to see through their smokescreen once
you have been forewarned. It is desperation on their part, and highly dubious
behaviour, so it is even more important that people stand up for their basic
human right to protest. At the bottom we also include some notes about not
breaching the injunctions themselves, and the dates they were issued on.
The Tactics . . .
Several police
officers, notably among them
What makes this an abuse of process is that they are using emails, letters and
phone calls sent before the injunctions were in place to justify their
claims. They are also to some degree stretching and interpreting the
Harassment Act to fit their needs, leading them to make some very dubious
claims in its name. Note, they use both the injunctions and the Harassment Act
in their arguments, and often, wrongly, confuse the two.
Seeing through the smoke
. . .
Firstly, for the vast
majority of people these communications (sent BEFORE the injunctions were in
place) were polite and legitimate. They would not amount to harassment with or
without the injunction.
Only if you have repeatedly communicated with an individual over a number of
occasions with the intention of causing fear or intimidation, or in an
aggressive manner would it amount to harassment. They are going to be hard
pressed to say that a few polite emails or letters fall into this category.
Secondly, as long as they were sent before the injunction was granted they do
not amount to a breach of the injunction itself. And if they were sent after
the injunction was granted, the police would still have to show that the
individual concerned actually knew about the injunction and what it contained
first. Nasser and Davidson are very good at considering breaking the injunction
and causing harassment as being the same thing, when in fact they are two
different offences.
This is the most important point. The injunction does cover types of peaceful
protest that would not normally be against the law, but unless someone has been
served with it directly or indirectly then they cannot be said to be in breach
of it. This means that someone who has not been served is not breaking the law
by making a phone call or sending an email to make polite complaints, contrary
to what F2 Chemicals, or other companies may tell you when you contact them.
In the case of the Japanese customers the injunction does still permit polite
calls to the switchboard, notwithstanding what they or the police may tell you
otherwise.
Where they know they cannot use the injunction, they are attempting to use the
Harassment Act directly. They are on even more dubious territory here. See our
legal guide for more information on the Harassment Act, but they have to show
that by sending the communications you intended to actually harass the
employees directly, which a polite email asking them to stop dealing with HLS
is hardly going to amount to!
Tips to protect yourself . . .
So, if a pair of
Lancashire's finest pork pie eaters makes demands of you, here are some tips to
keep you safe:
1) FIRST, EMAIL US BEFORE YOU SAY ANYTHING TO THEM OR AGREE TO MEET THEM - WE
WILL REPLY TO YOU STRAIGHT AWAY
2) CALL A FRIENDLY SOLICITOR FOR ADVICE; for more details see the last page of
the legal guide for activists at www.freebeagles.org, or email
[email protected] for a copy.
3) Unless they are summoning you to answer police bail or actually arresting
you, you do not have to go to the police station.
4) If you do go to the police station, make sure you have a friendly solicitor
with you, not a duty one who is ignorant of these particular issues.
5) You do NOT have to give a statement. In most cases it is best that you
don't.
6) Do not believe their lies and do not be bullied into accepting cautions or
making statements. If the communications the police discuss were sent BEFORE
the injunction was granted, then you have not breached it. Sending polite
emails to staff about their company's involvement with HLS does not amount to
harassment, no matter how much they threaten you with arrest.
It is possible that if you have written more than one email to the same person,
you may be arrested and charged with harassment even for writing polite emails.
This is because the police are saying that writing more than one email amounts
to harassment. However, they know this is not true and it is simply a part of
their campaign of intimidation. So long as the emails were polite and not threatening,
the charges will be dropped and you will then be able to sue for false
imprisonment. The important thing is not to let them frighten you. See our
guide on what to do at the police station at www.freebeagles.org for more advice on dealing with them.
7) If they overstep the mark, sue or put a complaint in. These men need to
realise that they are not going to be able to bully the animal rights movement
in such as crass way, or intimidate us from our basic human right to protest.
Remember, these coppers are acting purely on behalf of the companies in a
desperate effort to show that they are making headway against protests directed
against the animal abusers. The law is secondary to them, and they are bending
the truth on behalf of these HLS customers. What matters is that the
campaign is successful, and that they are trying to suppress action precisely
because of this.
Just say NO.
A photo of one of these 'coppers' can be found at http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2004/01/284634.html
Please pass this article on to any other animal rights contacts you may have.
It is important that people are not caught out by these police tricks. For more
information on your rights, please visit http://www.freebeagles.org/
or email [email protected]
Notes on the Breaching
the Injunctions . . .
You are not breaching the
injunction unless you have been served with it, or it can be shown you have
knowledge of its restrictions. But, if bailiffs have attempted to serve people
on a demo, then the police will treat them as having been served and arrest
them accordingly if they breach it. Those arrested will then have to argue in
court that they had a "reasonable excuse" to breach the injunction -
e.g. that they had not read it or did not understand it. This has worked well
as a defence where civil injunctions (Section 3 of the Harassment Act) such as
these were used against fur protestors. It's also worth noting that Section 3
is an either way offence - that is you are entitled to a jury trial, which is
another reason why the cops are not be keen to pursue trivial breaches.
It is important in these situations for the police / prosecution to show that
you have been served with the injunction. Service can take the form of being
directly served with the injunction by a bailiff at home or on a demonstration.
Or you could also be deemed to have been indirectly served if evidences
presented that you looked at it on the internet, something the police are
starting to place emphasis on - whether it is by looking at the SHAC website or
downloading the injunction directly. The former is not necessarily proof, but
the latter would in all probability be accepted as having knowledge of the
injunction.
However, there is no law against keeping regularly keeping your computer clean
and wiping any trace of the SHAC website and injunction from your computer. Use
software tools such as Evidence Eliminator, Clean Disk Security, PGP and
MacWasher to keep yourself protected in this fashion. In particular you need to
keep your browser cache and history files clean. If in doubt, please, please
feel free to get in contact with us and we can offer you further advice. Email
us at [email protected]. Similarly, there is no reason why you
have to keep a copy of the injunction in your house even if you've been served
with it.
Finally, being served with one injunction does not mean you have been served
with them all. Just because you have been photographed being served with the
HLS injunction, does not mean you have been served with the Asahi Glass
injunction or with any of the others.
The campaigning is obviously being effective, and that is all the more reason
not to be intimidated and caused to stop. So if you have not broken the law, or
the injunction, then there is no reason why you should stop. The police are
resorting to trickery to protect these companies out of desperation and not a
desire to uphold the law; but if you come prepared then there is little they
can actually do.
Injunction Dates . . .
The HLS injunction was
initially ordered last April and finalised on
The Japanese ones were initially ordered on 13th October and finalised on
Emerson was January 2004.
The Chiron injunction was first ordered at the start of February 2004 and
finalised on 3rd March.
The Phytopharm
one was also finalised on
This article is for information purposes only; its aim is to let people to know
their full rights under
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© Copyright freeB.E.A.G.L.E.S. 2004;
last updated: March 2004.