Star date: 30th May 2014

FOUR MORE BARTON MOSS PROTECTORS ACQUITTED AND ONE FINED £10 FOR SALFORD CIVIC CENTRE LOCK ON

Four Barton Moss anti-fracking protectors were acquitted at Manchester Magistrates Court yesterday of offences related to the lock on at Salford City Council reception last January. Another, who pleaded guilty to supergluing himself to a window at the Civic Centre, was fined just £10.

This now leaves the Barton Moss `score' at court: Protectors, via Lizars Solicitors 20 Greater Manchester Police/Crown Prosecution Service 1.

Full details here…

Last January five Barton Moss anti-fracking protectors locked-on in the reception area at Salford Council Civic Centre to raise awareness of the IGas exploratory drilling site, and in opposition to ConDem Government attempts to bribe the Council to accept fracking.

Three protectors locked on to a tube on the floor of the Council reception, while two glued themselves to the windows (For full details see previous Salford Star article – click here).

Yesterday, at Manchester Magistrates Court, the five protectors - Yellow, Kate, Nick, Jesus and Gadget – were charged with Public Order Section 4 offences for `causing distress to council workers', while two were further charged with Criminal Damage after supergluing themselves to Council windows.

All Public Order charges were dismissed after the protectors' barrister, Richard Brigden, pointed out to the judge that the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) had made the mistake of not charging them with a Section 5 offence, where the causing of distress to council workers would not have to be proven. No `distress' was proved so the CPS `submitted' half way through the case and the charges were dropped.

Meanwhile, on the Criminal Damage to the Council windows charges, one protector was found not guilty, while another, Gadget, who had entered a guilty plea, was fined just £10, reduced from £150 - after the barrister proved that the police could, and should, have used debonder to release him instead of cutting tools which damaged the window and the chair. Effectively it was the police officers who had caused the damage, not the protectors.

Now, of 21 protectors charged with offences related to anti-fracking protests at Barton Moss and defended by Robert Lizar Solicitors in court, twenty have had charges dismissed, dropped or been found not guilty.  

This now leaves the Barton Moss `score' at court…

Barton Moss Protectors 20...Greater Manchester Police/Crown Prosecution Service 1.

UPDATE: 7:30pm 30th May

The first cases of aggravated trespass due in court on Monday have been dropped - including the case against 15 year old Salford schoolgirl Saffron Hughes - click here

* See also previous Salford Star articles on the Barton Moss court cases – click here and click here

Photos outside court and additional reporting by Climate James

Salford Council lock on photos by Steven Speed