Campaign to refer the EDO MBM factory case to the Court of Appeal

The EDO MBM case is is a recent court case in Brighton involving five defendants who had broken into the EDO MBM owned arms factory in January 2009 at the time of Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in Gaza. The five admitted breaking into the factory — which was exporting military equipment at the time to Israel — and causing £180,000 ($275,000) worth of damage.

Despite actually admitting to an offence that would usually carry a substantial jail sentence, the jury acquitted them, accepting their defence that although they had committed a crime they were doing so in order to prevent the greater offence of Israeli “war crimes”.

The Judge in the case, George Bathurst-Norman, was quite explicit in his summing up for the jury in encouraging them to employ their political prejudices against Israel in their decision: “You may well think that hell on earth would not be an understatement of what the Gazans suffered in that time,” the Guardian quoted him as saying.

As the Guardian goes on to say: “The judge highlighted the testimony by Caroline Lucas, the Green MP for Brighton Pavilion, that “all democratic paths had been exhausted” before the activists embarked on their action.

The ZCC regards the acquittal of the five who admitted causing £180,000 of criminal damage in the EDO MBM factory in Brighton as an utter disgrace.

(The five  argued that they were seeking to prevent ‘Israeli war crimes’).

It seems that the ‘rule of law’ in the UK has effectively broken down,
since it varies according to the political bias of the Judge deciding on an individual case.

The ZCC

- calls on the UK Government to censure Judge George Bathurst-Norman who directed the Jury to a “not guilty” verdict.

- hopes that the prosecution refers the case to the Court of Appeal for clarification of the law.

- Is complaining to the Office of Judicial Complaints and calls on its supporters to do the same

The form can be found from this link http://tinyurl.com/2appu3d