London: Four Charged for ‘Black Lives Matter’ Attack on Police

Four males have appeared in court after police officers in London were attacked by a crowd shouting “black lives matter”.

Three men and a 13-year-old boy appeared at Thames Magistrates’ Court charged with what the prosecutor described as “an unprovoked, deliberate group attack on two serving police officers simply doing their daily jobs”.

PC Macpherson and PC Ali “fear[ed] they were going to die” as they were kicked, beaten and spat at by a crowd of men shouting “pigs”, “racist” and “black lives matter”, the court heard, according to The Sun.

Footage of the incident went viral last week, with public figures including UK Home Secretary Priti Patel taking to Twitter to condemn the attack as “sickening, shocking and disgraceful”.

The beating began after officers attempted to stop and question a man in Hackney, London, according to Sky News home affairs correspondent, Mark White.

The 13-year-old pleaded guilty to two charges of assaulting an emergency worker on Friday. He claimed he thought he had been “helping” someone by taking part in the attack, as a result of news coverage of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement leaving him “scared”, the Evening Standard reports.

Paul Kabemba, 33, Jordan Thomas, 20, and Marvin Henderson, 34, indicated not guilty pleas related to their alleged involvement in the incident, and all three men were freed on bail until a hearing on July 10th.

Prosecutor Varinder Hayre told the court that PC Macpherson “was in general fear for his safety and conscious of the crowd getting around him and shouting ‘pig’ and ‘ginger c***'”.

The male officer “felt a blow to his lower back and realised he was being attacked by the crowd”, she said, adding: “Suddenly he saw a male holding a silver baseball bat and PC McPherson said he was in fear for his safety and at that point he believed he was going to die or be seriously injured.”

Hayre then spoke of the female officer’s experiences, noting that PC Ali was “pushed and pulled … [and] kicked in the leg” while terrified that her colleague “was going to be seriously hurt and that she would be overpowered and hurt”.

“She said she was disgusted that she as a front line worker was then attacked by these males who were visibly larger and stronger than her,” the court heard.

Ken Marsh, chairman of the Metropolitan Police Federation, commented on the incident in a statement saying: “Yet again this starkly shows the dangers [officers] face and the bravery they show each and every day keeping Londoners safe.

“We are not society’s punch bags. We have families we want to go home to at the end of every shift, but the dangers are stark and seemingly escalating.”