Has sanity been restored to the UK?

July 8, 2010 @ 9:48AM

Has sanity been restored to the UK?

By Carlos Miller -...

Just as the madness against photographers in the United Kingdom is reaching its peak, the Home Secretary announced that police will no longer be allowed to stop-and-search photographers under the guise of fighting terrorism.

The announcement comes in the heel’s of the UK’s failed appeal against the European Court of Human Rights, which deemed the Section 44 of Terrorism Act 2000 a violation of human rights.

According to Journalism.com.uk:

In an oral statement given in the House of Commons this afternoon, Theresa May outlined interim measures which would “not allow the continued use of Section 44 (…) in contravention of our civil liberties”.

Speaking to the House she said these new interim measures will “bring section 44 stop and search powers fully into line with the European Court’s judgement”.

However, just because it is no longer legal to use Section 44 to harass photographers doesn’t mean that police will suddenly stop.

They might now turn to Section 43 of the terrorist act to harass photographers as they did on Tuesday to Jules Mattsson.

Mattsson is the teenage photographer who was detained last month for photographer cadets in a military parade and managed to record the entire exchange on an audio recorder.

Police used Section 44 to harass him the first time. They used Section 43 to harass him the second time.

Not that they don’t believe that Section 44 can still be used to harass photographers, according to the British Journal of Photography.

Asked by BJP on the reasons why Mattsson was stopped, a Metropolitan Police spokesman says that “a plain clothes Police Officer stopped and searched a 16-year-old male under Section 43 of the Terrorism Act. The officer spoke to the male about his behaviour. No offences were apparent and no further action was taken by the officer.”

The spokesman adds: “Although taking photos in itself is not an issue, if an officer witnesses what they deem to be suspicious behaviour then they are justified in carrying out a stop.In this instance the officer spoke to him about his behaviour. No offences were apparent and no further action was taken by the officer.”

The Metropolitan Police has also confirmed to BJP that Section 44 remains in place. “The MPS continues to use S44 stop and search powers under the Terrorism Act 2000,” says the spokesman. “S44 remains a legal power under current legislation. The current authority remains in place for it to be used at specific locations across London.”

Section 43 of the Terrorism Act 2000 requires reasonable suspicion that a person is a terrorist. Its usage is more limited than Section 44, which doesn’t require suspicion. However, the European Court of Human Rights recently found Section 44 to be illegal.

The act’s Section 43 reads: “A constable may stop and search a person whom he reasonably suspects to be a terrorist to discover whether he has in his possession anything which may constitute evidence that he is a terrorist.”

I suspect this new order against Section 44 will go down much like the operations order issued by the New York City Police Department last year. It will look good on paper but it won’t make a difference on the street.

Comments

Anonymous

1 year ago

When will the Brits figure out that the time they waste hassling a photographer could be better spent looking for (or hassling) real terrorists? Don’t they realize terrorists could send in a decoy disguised as a photographer to divert the cops’ attention, or just follow around a real photographer until the cops do a Section 43 or 44 shakedown, then do their nefarious deeds unmolested because the anti-terrorist cops’ attention is focused elsewhere?

Anonymous

1 year ago

The police in the UK know where the terrorists are, but they are afraid to go into those neighborhoods. So they harass law abiding citizens in order to provide the illusion that they don’t have a significant violent radical underclass of Islamist extremists.

Anonymous

1 year ago

Carlos is on NPR right now with Radley Balko. You can catch him on KQED’s iTunes feed.

Anonymous

1 year ago

#3: Uh, what exactly do you mean by “THOSE NEIGHBORHOODS”?

I don’t want to automatically jump the gun here, but i would sort of like to hear what you mean by that.

Anonymous

1 year ago

listening to the npr stream, but it’s a red cross segment.

Anonymous

1 year ago

By “those neighborhoods,” I mean Muslim neighborhoods in which the U.K. legal system permits Shaira courts to operate. The police are not exactly patrolling the streets there looking for terrorists, because the police are afraid.

Anonymous

1 year ago

Now that I’m boycotting everything British … I don’t give a shit about what they do over there! They should just shoot everyone with a camera and secure their lameass country.

Anonymous

1 year ago

R, could you possibly have your head any further up your own ass?
Jody recently posted..Sarah Palin vs Ron Paul

Anonymous

1 year ago

Carlos, I have to say that I don’t dig the new format, because now comments aren’t threaded, so it’s going to be one big morass.

Jody, humor obviously eludes you, as I’m pretty sure that R wasn’t being serious about the “shoot everyone with a camera” remark.

Anonymous

1 year ago

“Now that I’m boycotting everything British … I don’t give a shit about what they do over there!”

I don’t care either. Why is anyone surprised this is happening in The People’s Republic of Great Britain? All socialist leaning countries almost always come up with more and more laws controlling the citizens under the guise of protection of the state. This protection is either for the safety of others, or financial safety of the state. Since the US of A has been moving towards socialism over the last five or so decades, no one should be surprised the same things are happening here either.

Anonymous

1 year ago

carlos your email is bouncing back, san francisco is losing its fucking mind.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/5401159/meowwwww.jpg

conviction on mersle, involuntary manslaughter with sentence enhancement for using a gun during the commission of a crime.

Anonymous

1 year ago

I judge needs to hold UK responsible for what is going on in the gulf. I seen the latest NASA pics of the spill and I cried:

http://americaspeaksink.com/2010/07/bp-oil-spill-revolutionary-war-lost-...

Anonymous

1 year ago

You can find Carlos’ NPR segment at http://www.npr.org/templates/player/mediaPlayer.html?action=1&t=1&islist... @15:39 Main page: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5 and select July 8 for the title “The Rules And Your Rights For Recording Arrests”

Anonymous

1 year ago

Nice segment on NPR, Carlos. Not too balanced though since most of the police (if not all) who called in actually thought having citizens record them was overall a good thing. There was no opposition to citizen journalists. Too bad they couldn’t get that Saint Mary’s County Maryland state attorney to call in and explain why he’s charging a guy with felony wire tapping.

Anonymous

1 year ago

Maybe a little OT, but still it’s England – and a citizen stood up for his rights against a couple of bobbies that he filmed from his property: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VfQrDK9YHas&feature=related

Love the verbal slapdown: “This is not communist China, this is still a free country, mate.”