The charges against activist and independent journalist Tommy Robinson were dropped on Tuesday after a judge at the Westminster Magistrates’ Court found that a police order banning him from a protest in London was unlawful.
Mr Robinson, 40, was arrested in central London on November 26th for supposedly violating a ban from attending a pro-Israel demonstration. Police argued that he refused to comply with the order and therefore used synthetic pepper spray on him, placed Robinson in handcuffs and arrested him.
However, on Monday, it was revealed that Met Police Inspector Steve Parker-Phipps had filled out the wrong date on the dispersal order, writing the date of November 24 on the form rather than November 26th. He claimed the error was made because his laptop battery was “dying”. Parker-Phipps admitted in court that the order was likely not lawful because of the mistake.
Speaking outside the courthouse on Tuesday alongside one-time UKIP backer Lord Pearson of Rannoch and broadcaster Katie Hopkins, Robinson said: “Freedom of the press is under attack, freedom of speech has been under attack. My freedom of assembly, all these things have been taken from me. I’m now allowed into London. What’s been ruled on is the arrest was unlawful, the pepper spraying was unlawful. They arrested me on my daughter’s birthday, that’s now unlawful. Their bail conditions are unlawful. This is the first time I’ve been freely allowed in my capital city, and it’s on St. George’s Day.
“The point I want people to understand, I’ve just said I’ve won. Have we won? Do we have freedom? For the last six months I’ve been banned from entering my capital city, while jihadists have taken over our capital city, week in week out with the grace of the police allowing them to. I’ve had my restrictions, my right to a family life, I even went to court to ask whether I could take my children to the Christmas lights turn-on and I was refused that opportunity.
“For the last six months I’ve had to go to a Muslim police officer and ask permission to come into my own capital city, of which one of the meetings was to interview a member of Parliament. That Muslim police officer refused that request. That is a police state, that is not freedom. The judge today stood on the side of truth, but I have been in these politicised buildings too many times.
“I wasn’t allowed inside the M25 for six months… they’ve limited my ability for my activism, for my work, for my journalism. They’ve invaded the privacy — anyone I want to meet for my journalism, I have to give the British police their phone numbers, then they’d phone them. I had to tell them the times I’m meeting them, where I’m meeting them for the last six months.”
The case centred around a pro-Israel demonstration organised by the Campaign Against Antisemitism in central London on November 26th. According to reports, the organisation had contacted police to request Robinson be barred from attending the demonstration, despite the activist’s longstanding public support for Israel and the Jewish people.
The CEO of the Campaign Against Antisemitism CEO Gideon Falter — who grabbed headlines last week after police barred him from approaching a pro-Palestinian protest — said of the move to try to block Robinson from their November 26th rally: “No one wants to march with Tommy Robinson” adding that they hoped the police would prevent him from attending.
Robinson claimed that he was acting as a journalist at the time and therefore it was wrong for the police to issue the dispersal order in the first place. He also claimed that police body-cam footage was deleted and that it would have shown him asking police to wait for his colleague to come back with his car keys and that he was not trying to defy the order to leave the area.
Despite winning the case against him, Rebel News reporter Sheila Gunn Reid, who was in attendance at the trial, reported that no costs will be awarded to Robinson.
“This is the eighth time I’ve been in court on this offence at a cost of £60,000. This is about lawfare, the process is the punishment. You may come here and get a victory, but they’ve had the victory, they’ve controlled any opposition to Hamas on the streets of this country by banning me for six months, that’s what they’ve done.”
On Tuesday, Robinson added that he plans to hold a demonstration of his own on June 1st in London “against two tier policing” and to demand the resignation of Met Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley.