Five Just Stop Oil supporters found guilty for planning an action at Heathrow have launched appeals against their convictions after evidence emerged of serious misconduct by the jury.
Just Stop Oil: appeals against sentence launched
The five launching appeals were among eight Just Stop Oil supporters found guilty of conspiracy to cause a public nuisance by majority verdict at Isleworth Crown Court after a seven week trial before Judge Duncan.
Raj Chada of Hodge, Jones, and Allen will be filing appeals on behalf of Rosa Hicks and Hannah Schafer, while Adam Beard, Sally Davidson and Sean O’Callaghan will be filing separate appeals.
The grounds of the appeal include that the Attorney General has received evidence of juror misconduct during the trial which has been referred for police investigation. The misconduct arose from one juror making internet searches about the defendants and the Just Stop Oil campaign and sharing that within the jury room. In light of this evidence the appeal will say that the guilty verdicts are manifestly unsafe.
Further grounds for appeal include that the judge was wrong to imply that the existence of a climate emergency is a matter of opinion as that contradicts the agreed facts in the case and that the police exhibited prejudicial conduct during the trial including in front of the jury. They wrongly arrested Sally Davidson, mid-trial, after confusion over her bail conditions and arrested a Just Stop Oil supporter who had been sitting in the public gallery at court and in sight of one of the jurors, who later described the incident to two further jurors.
‘Devastating’
One of the appellants, Sally Davidson, 37, a hairdresser from Portland, Dorset said:
The prospect of facing a retrial is personally devastating but in the interest of justice we have no other option but to appeal these convictions. Some of our group have now spent nine months in prison awaiting trial and now sentencing.
Judge Duncan ruled early in our trial that the reality of climate breakdown while “concerning” was irrelevant to the jurors deliberations. She then intervened to stop us each and every time we tried to communicate the severity of climate collapse, and the threat it poses to the rule of law. In trials like ours, relating to acts of conscience, juries are being routinely told they must ignore reality, and focus on evidence without the relevant context.
This trend by members of the Judiciary to attempt to decouple the law from morality is not how most people understand the British legal system to work. It is obvious that these trials are politically motivated, morally wrong and a huge waste of public money. Money that could be better spent supporting vulnerable people and those who are being made increasingly unsafe due to the deadly impacts of unchecked fossil fuel burning.
Adam Beard, 55, a gardener from Stroud, who had represented himself at trial said:
After seven months in prison on remand for resisting the genocidal burning of fossil fuels, and more than seven weeks in court, it now looks like our convictions followed misconduct by at least one member of the jury. This followed a trial where we were frequently stopped by the judge from telling the jury the truth.
We will be sentenced on 16 May and I am likely to face further time in prison. For the sake of justice it is imperative that our convictions be quashed and my co-defendants who are still in prison be released.
A ‘gruelling trial’ – and now this?
Hannah Schafer, 61, a sailing instructor from Cardigan said:
We have been through a long and gruelling seven week trial which must have cost the state a small fortune. Much of this time was spent arguing about why we shouldn’t be allowed to explain our actions to the jury. We are now undertaking an appeal due to issues around the behavior of that jury. Is it any wonder they used their initiative to find out more after being fobbed off and sent out of the room numerous times during the trial?
This has led to a situation where our convictions could be deemed unsafe and we may have to go through the whole trial again. We have all spent time in prison, at yet more cost to taxpayers, and face long custodial sentences at our next appearance on 16 May.
Is this a sensible way to police peaceful protest? Is it a sensible use of the overstretched and under funded justice system? Does it represent good value for money? Or would it be more sensible to address the issues we are trying to draw attention to – the need to take urgent action to halt the death and destruction being willfully wrought on the world by the fossil fuel industry.
Tim Crosland, a former government lawyer and spokesperson for Defend Our Juries, said:
There is compelling evidence that these convictions resulted from a juror conducting Google research and sharing partially false and highly prejudicial information with their fellow jurors. Given the concealment of evidence from juries in these cases, it’s not surprising that juries lose faith in the process, with unpredictable results.
As it is, it should be obvious to everyone that that is a fatal flaw in the trial process and the convictions must now be quashed as a matter of urgency. For the moment the trial judge is left in the invidious position of having to pass sentence on people on 16 May, knowing that they have not properly been convicted of anything.
Let’s hope some common sense and humanity prevails.
Just Stop Oil: time will tell
The Heathrow trial , which was due to start on 20 January, was delayed after Isleworth Crown Court experienced problems with its heating system and ran into the limit of its ‘sitting days’ allowed by the Ministry of Justice. Defendants were told that the trial would be postponed to September 2025 at the earliest and possibly would not be heard until February 2027. Four days later they were informed that the trial would begin on 27 January.
The Heathrow eight are due to be sentenced on 16th May.
Two of the eight, Luke Elson and Luke Watson have been in prison on remand since 24 July 2024. Will Goldring was remanded following the trial to await sentencing. Rory Wilson, who pleaded guilty in September, was recently granted bail after being on remand for eight months.
If leave to appeal is granted the case may not be heard for many months. If the appeal were to be successful, and the convictions quashed, the most likely outcome is that the prosecution would seek a retrial.
Featured image via Jamie Lowe
