Post-riot repression hits Nottingham
Published:
August 28, 2011 11:13
by Nottingham Indymedia |
Neighbourhoods: nottingham
Published by group:
Notts Indymedia
In the aftermath of the riots that swept the UK earlier this month, local courts and authorities have been swift to crackdown. Notts Police have charged 75 people with offences relating to the disorder, including 18-year old Amed Pelle who was sent to prison for 2 years and 9 months for comments made on Facebook. Nottingham City Council have also jumped at the opportunity to look tough and Leader Jon Collins has said he ‘will seek to evict anyone who is directly involved, or whose sons or daughters have been involved in disturbances.’ In response a group has formed to resist any evictions.
On the newswire: 2 yrs 9 mths for chatting shit on Facebook | Stop Jon Collins’ vindictive evictions
Previous feature: Riots spread to Nottingham
With the Tories calling for exceptionally tough sentencing for those involved in the disturbances, a number of high profile cases have made headlines including a mother jailed for 5 months for handling stolen shorts (who was later freed on appeal), a man jailed for 6 months for stealing a bottle of water and a man jailed for 16 months for taking a lick of an ice cream.
There have also been sentences of several years for posting material on the internet that supposedly incited rioting. Two men from the North West were sentenced to 4 years in prison for ’inciting riots’ on 16th August. Jordan Blackshaw organised an event that only himself and the police turned up to, whereas Perry Sutcliffe-Keenan made a joke page called the Warrington Riots whilst drunk and then removed it the next morning. In Nottingham, 18-year old Amed Pelle was sentenced to 2 years 9 months in jail after making a number of pro-riot comments on his Facebook page.
Soon after the riots began the Government considered banning people from accessing social networking sites in order to quell the riots and met with the heads of Facebook, Twitter and Research in Motion (the company behind the Blackberry Messenger service) to ‘discuss their responsibilities in this area’. David Cameron asked the police whether they needed new powers to shut off social networking sites. Although the Government has since backtracked it is worth noting that the move received praise from the Chinese state. It is also worth noting that only months before, during the Arab Spring, the UK was commending the social networking of rioters who overthrew governments in Tunisia and Egypt.
Various central government and local authorities have also called for other punishments for those linked to rioting and their families, including stripping them of welfare benefits and evicting them from their council houses. Proceedings have already begun in the London Boroughs of Wandsworth and Southwark to evict tenants who have been charged along with their families. Campaigners against the evictions call the moves double punishment and collective punishment and have demonstrated outside the home of Ravi Govindia, the leader of Wandsworth Council. Nottingham City Council is also threatening to evict tenants from Nottingham City Homes properties. NCCLOLs has examined the tenancy agreement and recommends that those who might be affected seek legal advice soon.
Comments
Read it again
Published: August 31, 2011 07:35
by
Eyes open
Rant? Not really. It's mostly written in quite a dispassionate tone.
Not much about Nottingham? It talks about Jon Collins' statements and the case of someone from Basford.
Normal run of the courts seems to be working? If you love the police state perhaps.
Not as easy as they make out
Published: August 31, 2011 16:25
by
Carol Laidlaw
Check out my post under 'In The News' on my website:
http://carol-laidlaw.blogspot.com for information on this.
Also, if you look at the nearlylegal website, there are two posts with a more technical discussion on this issue.
Local authorities, and housing associations, will not have an easy or a smooth ride if the people they threaten with eviction get legal advice and fight the eviction in the courts. It will involve the public landlords in time and expense and they won't necessarily get the result they are after. Eviction for breaking your tenancy agreement by the 'anti social behaviour' of yourself, a member of your household, or a visitor is only possible if your landlord can prove a. that anti social behaviour has been committed and b. persuade the court that it is reasonable in the circumstances to evict you. The court might decide it isn't, or that a suspended possession order is appropriate. The decision is at the court's discretion, but it isn't a total discretion. The courts have to be guided by previous appeal cases as well as legislation and there have been a couple of appeal cases recently which make it more difficult for public landlords to evict their tenants.
It takes between 7 and 9 months for a contested case to get a hearing in the county court. If the tenant or whoever hasn't got involved in any more riots within that time, the landlord's chances of getting an eviction order will be further reduced. The court will be disinclined to believe that there's a continuing risk that the tenant will break their tenancy agreement.
Most local authorities now have sold off all or most of their council houses, which means they have few or no tenants they can evict. So talk of evicting people, for some of them, is hot air.
Advocating using the legal system to fight your landlord does not mean I think that direct action and campaigning shouldn't also be done (just in case anybody assumed so, as has happened before when I've put my ha'porth in on Indymedia ;-))
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Not much about Nottingham
This is a rant. Not much about Nottingham. Yes, we need to keep an eye on dictatorial stuff like Jon Collin's threats, but otherwise the normal run of the courts seems to be working.