Justice For the Tooting Four!

I am truly astounded by what has happened to me. Approximately two years ago, myself and other like-minded individuals decided to resurrect an existing Facebook Page, Action Against Ulez, as we were horrified at the prospect of the expansion of the Lez scheme to Outer London boroughs. The daily cost to drive ‘non compliant’ cars was obviously the main issue, but we were also stunned by the questionable communications between Deputy Mayor Shirley Rodriguez and Imperial College over Sadiq Khan’s claim that without the expansion of the Ulez scheme 4,000 premature deaths would occur every year. In fact, as the Jacobs Report made clear, the Ulez expansion would have a negligible impact on air quality and would have a disproportionate effect on the less well-off. We were not only deeply concerned about the financial cost but also the emotional and mental wellbeing of those whose lives would undoubtedly be changed by the scheme. To top it all, the ‘consultation’ process was deeply flawed and the results ignored.

In the early days, along with others, I attended various meetings, including those at City Hall, to express our unhappiness at the looming expansion. Sadiq Khan chose to use insulting language about our group, particularly after a meeting in Ealing, labelling us “far Right” tory voters and accusing us of being “Covid deniers” and “Nazis”.

We decided to arrange a variety of demonstrations aimed at raising awareness of these issues. Our group membership had grown in size and the Facebook page now had around 46,000 followers. The demographics of our membership was predominantly people aged 50 plus, many of whom had never demonstrated about anyting before in their lives. I organised a GoFundMe to fund placards, leaflets, banners and other materials we would use.

We decided to organise what we dubbed “Awareness Days” as we discovered that many people were completely unaware of the looming expansion and how it would effect their lives. Upcoming events would be advertised on the Facebook page and at every event local police were there to meet with myself and others to discuss what our plans were, what time our group would turn up and how many were expected. Our Awareness Days were always a family affair. Some of us would dress up as dinosaurs, dancing in the streets, and a group of women created a vocal unit called ‘The Ulezettes’ and regularly performed at these events. Awareness Days were often attended by local politicians who seemed to enjoy the very good natured atmosphere. Local police would occasionally assist us with setting up and we made a point of leaving every venue clean and free of any litter. The locations were chosen by us, also taking suggestions from the Facebook members. We held events at Trafalgar Square, London Bridge, Marble Arch and outside the BBC with others being more local. Over the last two years we have probably held about 75 of these events, none of which caused any problems, We supported Howard Cox, Khan’s anti-Ulez opponent in the Mayoral election, and would use our events to promote his campaign.

It is common knowledge that Sadiq Khan lives in Tooting, and while we know the name of the street he lives on, we don’t know his house number. In the summer of 2023, we decided to hold an ‘Awareness Event’ on Tooting Common, which is opposite his street. This event involved a barbecue, family fun and entertainment. It was a weekend event, and as usual, local police officers spent time with our group and raised no issues at all. We also held an event outside Tooting Broadway tube station.

We decided to have one of our last events before the Mayoral election at the junction of two streets, one of which was Khan’s. We expected this event to be no different to any of our previous ones, either in Tooting or elsewhere. This was likely to be one of the final opportunities to voice our opposition to the Ulez expansion scheme and campaign for Howard Cox. We were not at all concerned about the location and fully expected the event to go as well as it had done before.

On the day itself several members of the group arrived before 12pm, the advertised start time, and began setting up. We were soon joined by the local police who, as normal, were friendly and chatty, walking around engaging in conversations with various people. The event continued as normal, although several latecomers told us they were concerned at the high numbers of police vehicles assembled in side roads. As these vehicles disgorged their occupants, some of them appeared in our midst and it became chaotic and confusing. While there appeared to be suggestions that we should disperse and relocate to City Hall, no formal announcement was made to the crowd and no specific time for leaving the location was indicated. However, it was clear that the police wanted us to leave and we began the process of packing up.

Then, without any warning, five people were arrested in quick succession – including me!

I was walking on the pavement near where I’d parked my car. One of my jobs as to collect up the banners and placards and take them home with me in my car, ready to be produced again at the next demo. I was beckoned by an officer to follow him into the road where I was arrested using a level of force that was quite unnecessary.

Another man, Lloyd Dunsfored, was arrested just for filming my arrest

Alison Young was arrested as she sat on the floor removing her dinosaur suit.

Martin Whitehead was arrested as he was taking his own placards to his vehicle.

The fifth person to be arrested eventually had the charges against him dropped.

Later, we were charged with causing harassment, alarm and distress to Sadiq Khan.

When we received our charge sheets, we were astonished to discover that the police claimed to have interviewed all of us, shown us all the bodycam and CCTV ‘evidence’ they’d gathered, and claimed we had all given “no comment” interviews. In fact, none of the Tooting Four had been interviewed before being charged. This had all been invented by the police and it took several requests from the magistrates for this finally to be admitted. In our naivety, we felt that the case would be thrown out at this point, but it wasn’t.

We were released that evening, with bail conditions to keep away from Tooting and the surrounding area. We were called to Charing Cross police station weeks later where we were charged – again without being interviewed. The plea hearing was held in early August before Justice/Judge Turner. We all pleaded “not guilty” and Turner discussed the prospective length of the hearing and then checked his diary and suggested he would be available for a trial date of November 27th.

To our surprise, we learned that in fact we were not going before Judge Turner at Westminster Magistrates Court but someone else, District Judge Sternberg. As this had been dragging on for months we were keen to progress – two of us said we would be happy to continue with Sternberg, one was not happy to proceed and one wanted Sternberg to be asked about whether he was able to be impartial in his approach, given that there was some evidence he was friendly with the Mayor. Naturally, he confirmed that he wouldn’t allow this to sway his judgment and the trial went ahead.

Nine police officers were called to give evidence for the prosecution and provided bodycam footage. In the case of seven of these witnesses, the claims they made of road blockages and protestors supposedly preventing an emergency vehicle accessing the road were not supported by their own footage.

Once the prosecution had presented its case, our representative asked the Judge to dismiss the case as the evidence of the senior officers had not been supported by their bodycam footage and had been contradicted by the two local police officers who had been at the scene from the outset.

But to our total astonishment, Sternberg said he felt there was a case to answer and the trial would continue.

While I am no legal expert, it seems that the case relied heavily on the content of the placards and banners we carried. One officer swore on oath that he had seen a placard saying “FUCK KHAN”, even though there was no such placard. When one of the defendants was questioned he confirmed he had a “FCUK KHAN” sticker on his hat – clearly a play on the advertising campaign of French Connection many years ago. The police officers said there were placards with blood on them, the event was advertised as “Khanage at Khan’s” and I had a high-viz jacket with the words “STOP THE KHANAGE” on it. It was implied that all of these could cause alarm and distress to Khan.

In my own cross examination, I explained that the placard with blood mentioned said “BLOOD ON YOUR HANDS” – clearly not a threat to Khan.

In his summing up, Sternberg referenced my high-viz jacked and the name of the event, stating that “KHANAGE” refers to the killing of many people. While it isn’t my intention to go into the summing up any further, I hope this gives an indication of Sternberg’s mindset and how the case really rested heavily on the signage.

We were found guilty and I was found to have a higher level of “culpability” than the others and ordered to pay a total of £1,310, comprising a £750 fine, a £300 victim surcharge and £260 of legal costs. Outside the Court, we pointed out that a group of Just Stop Oil protestors, who staged a demo outside then-PM Rishi Sunak’s Kensington home last year, were charged with harassment, but were all acquitted by a judge at Stratford Magistrates’ Court, following a successful submission that there was no case to answer.

We intend to appeal.

Stop Press: You can watch a YouTube video of the press conference held outside the court here.