Email To: Derek Thomas MP for St Ives and Scilly 26:2:2019
Dear Derek
Re: AUTOMATIC LEGAL AID FOR STATE-BEREAVED FAMILIES
Is it fair that families of those killed by police have to go through an agonizing process of form-filling and means-tests to apply for legal-aid when in these circumstances a policeman or woman accused of killing a citizen automatically gets the best barristers to represent them at the cost of thousands of pounds of tax-payer-s money~
Surely not -
I wonder if you will support a move to bring equality - compassion and proper justice to this situation~
There is now an active campaign to grant the same automatic legal representation to State-bereaved families as is enjoyed by police who take lives - Surely it is a matter of basic justice that traumatized families should get the same degree and quality of assistance as police constables who take lives -
I ask you sincerely to lend your strongest support to this campaign and to show your support for justice in our land-
(1) I was set-up on two false felony-charges that the State Attorney’s Office dismissed against me.
(2) Law enforcement disclosed my identity as a confidential informant to people who had the ability to kill me.
(3) The Pinellas County, Florida Circuit Court refused to allow me to disclose my past as a confidential informant and matters relating to such in my trial.
(4) The Pinellas County, Florida State Attorney’s Office filed a Motion B in limine prohibiting me from being able to raise anything in my trial on the charges I’m incarcerated on, about not being allowed to have my confidential informant file for the trial.
(5) The court denied every attempt I made to disclose matters relating to my past as a confidential informant.
In some situations it is necessary to police the police as they sometimes break the law - This takes courage and is not easy - In holding rogue-police to account you lessen the chances of further brutality-offences in the future - Do not be afraid to film the police at any time - You-ll be doing the public a service!
I-d also like to take a moment to reflect on all those killed around the world by police-brutality in its many manifestations - to remember the dead at home and abroad and to encourage you all to work for the living by upholding justice whenever you have to - If we all wait for leaders we might have a very long wait!
After years of training in a secret lokation in North East Tibet The Limpet returns to the West and goes underground to infiltrate Babylon-system and spread revolution and expose injustice -
There are many people in prison in USA who by rights should not be there. With a prison-population that has peaked at well-over two-million, Amerika has a nation within its own nation. Among the very many people wrongfully incarcerated inside that nation, the case of Harold Hempstead stands out as an extreme story of injustice faced with incredible courage and humanity, which is why I've written many previous blogs on him at this site, and also work with Harold to run the website Harold Hempstead Caged Crusader Wordpress where I publish his evidence on human rights abuses in the Florida Department of Corrections and specifically on the case of the murder of mentally disturbed convict Darren Rainey. What happened to Rainey was so evil that it catalyzed all sorts of people into action. The case has dragged on for over five years now without satisfactory result as yet, but due to its gravity, I believe this murder will eventually receive the full international exposure it warrants.
I was talking to someone in a shop the other day and she randomly referred to the 'state of the world' with a sense of 'what can you do?' I understood her feeling, and it certainly can be overwhelming to contemplate the daily flood of tragic, cynical and violent news stories. My answer to her was that for anyone thinking of trying to take on the 'problems of this world,' you just had to pick a front and start fighting.
There are many ways you can fight for a better world for your children. For anyone who does not know me, I use the word 'fighting' in the sense of struggle for a cause. I'm no advocate of violence except in extreme cases of self-defense. Planting a tree and raising it can help nature and reward you with a feeling that you could get no other way. Befriending old folks and giving them a bit of help with their needs is always appreciated. Some old folks are too proud to ask for the help they actually require, so a bit of tact is needed. Some people round where I live like to organize Beach-Clean-Ups and get everyone out collecting the plastic and rubbish from our beautiful coast. Someone in West Cornwall is organizing holiday accommodation for the people who lived at Grenfell Tower in West London and survived the traumatic and terrifying fire that destroyed so many lives and homes and perhaps signals the end of the tower-block as a 'housing-solution.' Some people rescue animals and re-home them, others give their time to plant bee-attracting flowers in the park, now the corrupt local council has given up on planting them, citing the neo-con bullshit about 'austerity', whilst paying themselves handsome salaries. So there is corruption and injustice and pollution everywhere around you if you care to open your eyes to it. It's like tidying up a room - don't get bogged down in the totality of the mess, just start by picking up one thing and dealing with it. Just pick a front and start fighting.
When he witnessed the brutal slaughter of Darren Rainey in a Florida prison torture-chamber, Harold Hempstead went through a long, dark night of the soul and came through it a changed man. Trained from childhood by corrupt Miami police in espionage and evidence collecting, framed for witnessing against police crimes and sentenced to one hundred and sixty five years, Harold Hempstead had already endured over a decade in Florida's gulag, its production-line of death, when he witnessed the Rainey murder and, having made a deep commitment to Jesus Christ while in prison, Harold risked his life to witness, speak-out and testify to the numerous crimes of Florida's prison guards, staff and officials.
This website and Harold's own site will be continuing to publish more evidence on the Darren Rainey murder and other human rights issues in FDC, please follow and share this info, particularly with anyone you know who is politically active and working for justice. With what's happening in the USA these days, Justice needs all the help it can get. There's some people over there who take 'Justice For All' as their war-cry, and I salute their courage, energy and imagination with the deepest respect and admiration. Many activists have had family members killed by police or prison-guards, or seriously violated in prison and they've had to stand up to intense intimidation from the Amerikan state and its machinery. It's good to share information on facebook and sign petitions but it's also good to take it to the streets - after all, this world is ours, isn't it?
A sunny day in Penzance town, rocks and seaweed
in the street from the recent storm, I took a hike up the broadway and soon
found myself-
So there I was in front of jobcentreplus – in the old days it used to be called the Job Centre, before that it was the Labour Exchange – but that was deemed to be too party political.I remember leaving school at 16 where they’d spent years training me to spell and punctuate properly because you can’t get a job otherwise, and now, a couple of brief years later, I find myself- outside jobcentreplus, remembering the vibe of the dole queue.Psychology is hilarious stuff, isn’t it?As soon as you stand in front of the dole office (as I still call it) you imagine that people on the street passing by assume you are ‘between situations’.We all know that people do tend to make assumptions – to some extent it’s necessary for survival.But that person standing outside the dolecentreplus, are they ‘between positions’ or are they a physicist, secret agent, ballet dancer or anthropologist, who just happens to be leaning against that wall for a moment?Humanity swirls and flows around the streets and pootles down the roads in vehicles of shiny metal.Ah, there’s Roger with the placard, now we can get started.
At the first meeting of the Penzance Branch of
the West Cornwall Chapter of The People’s Momentum, it was decided to stage a
double-edged protest – to simultaneously highlight the tax avoidance at the
‘top’ of society and also the British government’s policy of ‘sanctions’
(withdrawal of money) against society’s most vulnerable members. Personally I was there partly to honour the
memory of the more than two thousand dead, those who died within a fortnight of
being selected as ‘fit for work’, even though they were all known to be suffering
from terminal cancer. (Not everybody knows about this shit…) Also I was aware that the United Nations is
investigating the UK, the first nation on earth to suffer the humiliation of
being investigated by the international community for abuse of the human rights
of the disabled – thanks Dave, Iain, George, Theresa, Derek Thomas and Co…..
Our
friend Anthony arrived with a camera. Roger
handed me a large cardboard placard saying SANCTION TAX-DODGERS NOT JOB SEEKERS
which I held up as he started to distribute some flyers. The very instant I held up the sign, a man
in a white shirt came out of the dole office, jumped in front of me and began
babbling strange and offensive nonsense very close to my face. He immediately accused me of pushing him,
said he ‘got it on the cctv’ or some such Newspeak and told me that I had to
leave because jobcentreplus is, and I quote here, ‘private property’. I heard the distant rattle of a long dead,
laughing Kafka wafting through the air. It’s
not the first time I’ve felt the foetid breath of a knuckle-dragger puffed my
way – funnily enough, he looked a lot like David Byrne of the Talking Heads,
which added a further frisson of surrealism to the curious vignette that was
unfolding like a flower at dawn. I told
Mr Byrne that I had not pushed him and I considered him to be rude. I hate people when they’re not polite. He gleefully pulled out his ace card – he had a real live cop right there in the
dole office and he was going to bring him out!!! (Perhaps I should clarify at this point that
the bloke in the white shirt (David Byrne) was not a dole-worker but a Guard of
Public Security, a sort of hybridized, privatized quasi-‘guard’ type figure,
more of whom later) {Taxonomical note: Homo sapiens sapiens should arguably be
reclassified as Homo sapiens
neandertalis, as the two species interbred and Neanderthal DNA resurfaces
constantly in human phenotypes}.
The
constable duly emerged and we engaged him in a friendly conversation. We’d already decided not to get into a
confrontation with the ‘guards’, as this would divert us from our purpose. We decided to carry on and ignore them.
The
cop was quite interested in what we had to say.
People were stopping and chatting, taking leaflets, enjoying a
conversation about politics. I noticed
the cop was packing a stun-gun and engaged him in a discussion (slightly
one-way) about law. He was not aware
that our nation is being investigated for breach of the human rights of the
disabled. Obviously cops on the street
don’t study all the minutiae of international law, they have to prioritise and
be pragmatic. He was also somewhat
surprised when I informed him that his ‘taser’ stun-gun was an illegal weapon
of torture. It was funny, because as I
talked to him I accidentally kicked his foot quite gently – if it had been in
Florida I would have had my feet hacked off with blunt meat cleavers before
being slowly lowered into a pit of boiling tar…
I apologized and he didn’t arrest me for assault. Of course they don’t tell the cops that their
weapons are illegal – that wouldn’t make any kind of sense, but after several
years working on the RESIST CARDIAC ARREST campaign I felt it my duty to bring
him up to date with the legal position on the X-26, or the ‘portable
electric-chair’ as it’s known in Amerika.
The policeman left the stage and Greg Martin, a
photographer for the local paper – The Cornishman – came along. Shutters fluttered and ephemeral images were
caught behind glass – itself a liquid in constant flow. People came and went and the atmosphere had
improved wonderfully since David left the stage. There were automotive honks from drivers,
waves, smiles and shouts of “quite right” and “I agree”. Apparently a couple of builders heckled, but
hey, let them heckle the shackles of the shekel, I say. I think the main
thing is that a serious message was put out in public and people were generally
in agreement with it. It also got into
local press, which will have a far bigger knock-on effect than the event
itself. I can only hope that our ‘propaganda of the
deed’ might have inspired some people to get authentically involved; to get politically active, informed and
focused and add their collective push to the wheels of progress, democracy,
hey, perhaps even socialism! Thousands
of years ago, in ancient Athens, the people managed to find time for making a
living and participating regularly in political
activity. If those old Greeks could find
time to address their political matters, then surely after two and a half
thousand years of progress, us modern democrats can find the odd half hour or
half day to dedicate to social reform….. After dipping an arthritic digit into
the great and mighty river of local politics in West Cornwall I felt inspired
to say ‘come on in, the water’s lovely!’
A very pleasant morning’s work altogether. After an hour and a half we considered the
action to be done.
(old school)
At one point, a lady went in to talk to the
‘guards’ – possibly about their behaviour, but I’m not sure. As she came through the double doors she
mentioned the name of the ‘guards’ company – the notorious G4S. I called through to the ‘guards’, telling
them that G4S had murdered a deportee on a plane, an African man, Jimmy Mubenga
– G4S are a bunch of murderers! They
didn’t come out that time.
Everything is connected. The lying thugs that guard the ‘private’
jobcentredivide in sleepy old Penzance, Cornwall, are the same company of
racist pigs that get away with murder by asphyxiation because a ‘judge’ rules
that the more than 76 extreme racist texts on the G4S ‘guard’s’ phones could
NOT be admitted as evidence to the jury – even though they clearly establish a
racist bias that would obviously contribute to the murder. Privatising ‘guard’ services leads to an
increase in violence coupled with a decrease
in accountability. Under Conservative capitalism
everything is up for sale – that is rule number one. As those private ‘guards of public security’
slowly killed Mr Mubenga on a tourist plane full of witnesses, he was heard to
gasp I CAN’T BREATHE – I CAN’T
BREATHE…. These were the last words
out of his mouth before his soul departed his fleshy frame. I CAN’T BREATHE – then he died. After this
flagrant murder, the company should have been liquidated and guard services
carried out by public officials who at least would be more accountable. It would also help if the judge was not a
racist, of course. Mr ‘Justice’
Spencer ruled that the large number of texts of extreme race-hate speech had no
bearing on whether or not two of the three accused G4S ‘guards’ asphyxiated Mr Mubenga by forcing his head forwards (this is known as
positional asphyxia – a well known cause of cop-related-death-syndrome around
the world and at home) and ignoring his repeated protests that he could not
breathe. Well G4S are not keen on
protesters, are they? They killed that
black man once and for all and every time I see their sick little logo I see
tears of Angolan blood leaking out of it and hear the sobs of the
families. Stuart Tribelnig, Terence
Hughes and Colin Kaler were never even charged with murder. They were acquitted of manslaughter – the
Spencer judge entity did not think they slaughtered the man – or perhaps Mr
Spencer thinks an Angolan is not worth as much as an Englishman. The lawyers defending G4S killers argued that
releasing the evidence of the hate-texts that the judge had agreed were
“grossly offensive and undoubtedly racist” would “release an unpredictable and
uncorrectable cloud of predjudices” which they argued would be detrimental to
the interests of their ‘clients’, G4S.
Old ‘justice’ Spencer couldn’t agree more and upheld their move. After all, it would not be fair to the
murderers to let the jury see the evidence of their profound racial hatred –
the jury might make a wild and unscientific assumption that the G4S guys who
murdered Mr Mubenga were just old-style, common or garden fascist
bastards. Everything I write is my own
opinion, nobody else’s (unless they agree) and I speak for no-one else unless I
specifically say so. I know the
judiciary do not welcome public criticism as some years ago the government
bullied a service-provider into closing down a website that was recording and
expressing opinion on the judgements made in various British courts. Free Speech?
Ask Mr Mubenga.
A sunny day in Penzance town, rocks and seaweed
in the street from the recent storm, I took a hike up the broad way and soon
found myself imagining three black men asphyxiating a white security guard in
front of dozens of witnesses and all being acquitted of manslaughter and walking
free from court – hardly likely is it?
“…but as I was sure they were policemen, I
expected them to know what they were doing.
I feel terrible because I did not do anything.”
“I didn’t get involved because I was scared I
would get kicked off the flight and lose my job.”
Consider the regrets of the acquiescent, politically
inactive folk, worried about their jobs, afraid to confront authority, even
when their conscience is squirming and screaming out within them.
The last words of Jimmy Mubenga:
“What
kind of people are you that do nothing?”
Use the search-term ‘G4s prisons international’
if you wish to see a heap of evidence of G4S staff involvement in torture,
murder and other human rights abuses around the planet. This is from their prison website: “Working Prisons help provide this rehabilitation, creating
people who are ready and willing to work, and providing great opportunities for
business.” Sounds a bit like the old job centre
spiel, doesn’t it?
I'm Jeremy Schanche, British artist and activist. This blog features my paper, The Limpet. Here I write about human rights, the environment and politics. Please see my articles about Harold Hempstead and Florida Department of Corrections, with more at Harold Hempstead Caged Crusader Wordpress.com.
I have another blog that's completely different - it's where you'll find The Caterpillar, a journal of collage, poetry and surrealism that is remixed as The Caterpillar Dub - the world's first Dub newspaper. Both of these can be found at:
http://yecaterpillar.blogspot.com.
In October 2024 I published my first paperback book of fiction - The Horned Whale or An Morvil Kornek by Jeremy Schanche - available at various bookshops and at Amazon.
ISBN: 9780993490903.
175,710 words.
£15.
Contains the mystery novel - The Kramvil, plus two novellas, poetry and glossaries.
