TRIAL A TRAVESTY

(Some hasty notes)

The fateful day of my Trial finally arrived on 22nd August 2006. It turned out to be a travesty of justice.

After having to sit thru the sentencing of a woman who had embezzled £15,000 from her boss, proceedings got underway at about 11am.

- My defence solicitor pleaded 'Not Guilty' on my behalf

(The charges against me: "on 04 July 2005 at Canning Street, Edinburgh you DAVID KING did whilst acting with a disorderly crowd and with your face covered conduct yourself in a disorderly manner shout, swear, threaten to urinate and defecate on police officers, place the lieges in a state of fear and alarm and commit a breach of the peace")

- 1^st Police Witness

Examined by Crown

Cross-examined by defence

Vague & Downright Wrong

The officer was very vague about details, & got some information wrong, eg he claimed the crowd 'congregated' in Canning Street & was asked to disperse. On the contrary, it was pointed out by defence, that the procession was cordoned into Canning Street & prevented from leaving for at least 3½ hours.

However, he claimed to be completely certain that I called the police "animals" & "fucking fascists" & "arseholes" & threatened to 'defecate & urinate" (sic) "on" them, then "at" them. He claimed these were my actual words.

He confirmed that he took no verbatim notes at the time.

He denied that he could be mistaken in his recollection.

He agreed that my bandana was worn only as a neckerchief & did not cover my face.

Video Nasty

Video of police evidence shown. Sound on the TV equipment faulty.Trial had to be shifted to another courtroom (this took some time), where it was then shown in full. Video lasts 6 minutes 47 seconds (out of approx. 3½ hours in Canning Street). It consists of 12 edited clips, one of which is repeated twice. Many of the clips are irrelevant to the charges.

I used the word 'bloody' ('your bloody helicopters burning carbon') ONCE. The clip was repeated twice. That was the 'worst' swear word I used.

(The video shows another person repeatedly using the word 'fucking' to me. I do not reciprocate but walk away peacefully. The other person was NOT arrested for swearing.)

(Also, incidentally, the Procurator Fiscal (name of prosecutor in Scotland) audibly used the phrase 'bloody thing' in the courtroom earlier in some pre-trial banter!)

In the video, the senior officer present is shown making a loud-hailer announcement that under Section 14 of Public Order Act 1986 he is Imposing a cordon. An edited-in voiceover gives the time as 12.54.

I am heard to remonstrate: 'Lies, lies. Police State.' Once only, lasting a few seconds.

In fact, the officer WAS misrepresenting the truth. Not only does Section 14 POA not authorize cordons, it does not even apply to processions. Therefore the officer was applying the law incorrectly.

In the video I also clearly state " I believe in peace & am completely non-violent."

Memory Malfunction, Mistaken Identity

- 2^nd Police Witness

Examined by Crown

Cross-examined by defence

When asked to identify me, he pointed to someone in the public gallery at the back right hand side of the room. I was sitting where defendants usually sit in the centre of the court directly facing the sheriff. The Procurator Fiscal (prosecutor) prompted him to try again. He again identified the wrong person. After repeated prompting from the P.F., who drew his attention to my photo displayed in the paused video, the officer finally pointed to me. The person he originally pointed to several times bore no resemblance to me & was of much larger physical stature.

The officer said his memory was vague because the events had occurred over a year ago. He couldn't remember important details about whether there were police lines at both ends of Canning Street (there were, ie the cordon). He claimed the crowd had "brought Canning Street to a halt", whereas the police had brought the procession to a halt in Canning Street with their cordon & there was no other traffic in what is a fairly quiet side street.

Despite these imprecisions & lapses of memory, he was adamant in his certainty that I called the police 'animals' & "arseholes" (corroborating the first witness) & 'fascist bastards' (slight variation on first witness).

He also echoed the first witness in the 'threatened to defecate & urinate' accusation. However, when questioned closely on this he admitted he wasn't sure if I had used the words 'defecate & urinate" or the more vernacular "shit & piss". On reflection, he opted for "defecate & urinate" as the exact words I used.

He claimed I was "aggressive", without specifying how exactly, & said that I became more so as the afternoon wore on (a period conveniently not shown in the video evidence, although police video cameras, plural, were present all afternoon filming any approaches to the police lines.)

He conceded that he did not feel 'frightened or alarmed' by my behaviour, but was upset.

He would admit to no possibility that his recollection of what I said may have been in any way flawed, given the confusion of events & the presence of several hundred other people.

He denied that he was lying or committing perjury. (I asked my solicitor not to use these words before the trial, but she threatened not to represent me with seconds to go before we entered the courtroom so I was reluctantly forced to agree that she could use them - as they were accurate if not diplomatic.)

Finally I Get to Speak ...

- My solicitor suggested closing defence at this point, but I said I wished to speak in my defence (so that I could refute the police allegations.)

- I was questioned by my solicitor

I explained that my visit to Edinburgh was my first break away from home for 5 years. I attended a talk by the Green MEP Caroline Lucas at the Usher Hall on Sunday night, 3^rd July. I spoke to the owner of a bookstall there. He said he had a bookshop at St John's Church at the West End of Princes Street. The next day (4^th), I went there. I saw there was a Carnival Procession gathering in the vicinity. I had half an hour spare before going to a talk on Climate Change at Teviot Row. As I've enjoyed Carnivals since I was a kid & am interested in both the history & contemporary manifestations of Carnival, I decided to follow the Samba Band & other colourfully dressed street theatre characters for approx. half an hour before the talk. I saw that the police allowed the procession to begin, so assumed it was legal. Within minutes & without warning, the entirely peaceful & orderly carnival had been penned into Canning Street. We were not allowed to leave. I knew no-one else in the procession. I did not consider myself part of a 'disorderly crowd'.

I refuted accusations of what I said to the police.

For instance, having been vegetarian for the best part of 40 years, & loving & respecting animals, I do not use the word 'animals' as term of abuse. I did not call the police 'animals'. It would be fairer to say that they are all too human, especially in their mistaken recollection of events.

I said I did not use vulgar Americanisms like "A***holes" & that whoever had scripted this had watched too many Hollywood movies. I don't speak that way, it is simply not my style. I am an Honours English Graduate & do not need to resort to such vocabulary.

I denied threatening to 'defecate & urinate on' the police, pointing out the physical impossiblity of doing so 'on' a row of 6' something riot police. I suggested that it was an extremely unlikely scenario & quite frankly absurd.

The less sensational truth of the matter was that I had quietly & politely asked to be released from the cordon as I needed to go to toilet. A policeman had told me that we were to use the toilets in the nearby office building, whose staff would let us in. I tried but the doors were locked & the staff refused to open them. So I had no alternative but to 'hold it in'. After my arrest, I asked repeatedly to be allowed to urinate & was finally instructed to do so into an empty water bottle while wearing handcuffs. When I said that this was not possible, one handcuff was freed & I was allowed to micturate in the gutter.

...But Am Curtailed

Defence questioning ended, although my solicitor had assured me beforehand that I would get a chance to address & refute each charge, the video evidence & the police statements. I was only allowed to say a tiny fraction of what I needed to. There was a palpable sense of hurry, as the afternoon was wearing on (after the delay of changing courtrooms.)

- I was cross examined by the so-called 'Crown'

The Procurator Fiscal was much outraged by my use of the phrase 'police state' to describe what I experienced. I told him that I was nmerely echoing the driver of an Edinburgh Omnibus ("it looks like a police state out there") & also more tellingly George Churchill-Coleman, who headed Scotland Yard's anti-terrorist squad as they worked to counter the IRA during their mainland attacks in the late 1980s & early 1990s.

He interrupted me at this point, but I insisted in referencing the actual quotation to prove I wasn't just making it up. I read

"He (Churchill-Coleman) said in an interview with the Guardian 28^th January 2005, ' I have a horrible feeling that we are sinking into a police state and that's not good for anybody. We live in a democracy and we should police on those standards."

The prosecutor was visibly annoyed by my remarks. He reprimanded me that I had to obey the laws that the police imposed.

I wished to inform him that the senior officer had actually applied the wrong law (Section 14 POA, see above) but was not allowed to do so.

Summing Up Doesn't Add Up

- Summing up by P.F. He exchanged a few case references relating to Breach of the Peace with the Sheriff, citing them only by name, without any further explanation.

- Summing up by Defence: previous good character etc., describing me correctly as a pacifist. Wrongfully said that I had previously been on many peace demonstrations without trouble. In fact I rarely ever go on any kind of demonstration (as they tend to be no more than futile gestures). She may have given the erroneous impression that I am some kind of serial protestor.

- Sheriff said 2 charges ('face covered' & 'placed the lieges in a state of fear & alarm') were dropped but I was still guilty of Breach of the Peace. She conceded it was my first offence.Case adjourned for Social Enquiry Reports. Bail was granted. I am to attend on 19^th September at 9.30am for sentencing.

PS Positively last words on this subject, I hope (though it obviously still rankles).

I shall wear my conviction for Breach of the Peace as a Badge of Honour. Yes, let history record that the writer Davy King was convicted of BoP during the visit of the G8 in 2005, when the War Criminals Bush & Blair came to Scotland. Let it also be known that the latter circumstance was the only reason for the massive deployment of riot police & the subsequent inordinate number of arrests made. Moreover, let it not be lost to posterity, that 2 policemen (named in the Indymedia report cited above) committed perjury in a court of law presided over by one Sheriff Poole (aka Milady). So long as the mighty Google shall reign, may the taint of corruption & disgrace forever adhere to their tarnished names. Amen.

PPS I earnestly petition the European Court to redress this blatant miscarriage of justice, an outcome as probable as pigs  sprouting wings & becoming airborne...

 

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