This article is not going to be long. Simply because what I am about to write is a statement of fact, the evidence is clear and in the open, there is no need to weave a web of conspiracy and intrigue. Instead what is needed is a willingness of good people to stand up, organise themselves in order to work together to bring about justice.
Recently in the news, many stories have been published asserting that the man responsible for the death of Ian Tomlinson on 1 April 2009 cannot be prosecuted because of the words written in a report by an ‘incompetent’ pathologist named Freddy Patel, 63. I will not insult your intelligence by engaging in the trivia being presented as mitigating factors by ‘journalists’ and spokespersons for the state over ‘blood’ and ‘fluid’.
Instead, let’s be blunt. Hiding behind this excuse is the Metropolitan Police Force and Paul Stephenson its commissioner, Simon Harwood, the officer who used violence to criminally assault the innocent Ian Tomlinson, Nick Hardwick whose Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) has a proven track record of eagerness to protect state interests before that of the public and the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and its ambitious director of public prosecutions, Keir Starmer QC. Why would any of these accept the behaviour of Harwood on that day as acceptable conduct for an officer of the law? Why has he not been prosecuted for manslaughter or at the very least ABH and faced disciplinary action removing him from public service? What of the other officers with him who have by their silence and inaction publicly condone his assault and also should be removed from public service.
I have taken the extraordinary decision to write in this manner on the topic because I believe in the need for a free media, I believe that both justice and democracy even the corrupt versions implemented here in the UK is best served by the presence of impartial bodies who investigate complaints, mistakes, successes and most important of all provide checks and counterbalances for all abuses of power by acting as observers of authorities through the process of providing critical analysis and informed comment. This is justice.
Yet over the past few weeks the overwhelming majority of the British media (except the Guardian) has shown little commitment to these values. They have in short colluded with the states attempts to protect itself from a legitimate charge of murder by presenting Freddie Patel as a sacrificial lamb to divert the public from focusing on its own culpability.
Let me declare right now. I have no sympathy for Freddie Patel, he most certainly needs to pay for his crimes, indeed I have already on numerous occasions made public my opposition to his use by the state as the man to send when they need a dodgy report to mask a death in custody or abuse by authority. The review of his cases by the General Medical Council (GMC) should not be limited to a couple of years, so many Africans have died in custody and had information revealing the true causes of death denied from grieving relatives seeking justice by corrupt medical practitioners such as Patel who have deliberately falsified records to get the state of the hook. It is my belief that Patel is very competent, he knows exactly what he is doing because he has been told and paid to do it.
For years Patel was a member of the Home Office’s network of accredited forensic pathologists. This was despite or perhaps because of his sabotage in 1999 of the Roger Sylvester family attempts to seek justice for the death of the 30-year-old African who died in police custody.
The Home Office register which is managed by the National Policing Improvement Agency also kept him on the list despite him not meeting the requirements to have a contract with a police force or being a member of a group practice which would have meant a team of three or more forensic pathologists would have been required to check his work. He was a lone unaccountable quack doctor who could be called and relied upon to quickly and quietly produce the reports needed to bury controversial cases.
Why else would the state employ him over and over again on these kind of cases unless they were sure he would deliver the results. Which leads us back to the question of culpability, you see if Patel is as ‘incompetent’ as is claimed by the GMC, then surely those who monitor, supervise and authorise his work must also share some of the blame in his alleged failings?
Unless of course he did not fail, unless if it hadn’t have been for the revelation of video footage exposing the police abuse during that fatal incident that led to Tomlinson’s death - business would have been resuming as normal. In most cases of police brutality the camera is typically ‘not working’, or ‘pointing in the wrong direction’. And even in cases where there is video footage, police force officers are excused their murderous behaviour by investigating bodies such as the IPCC (or its spiritual father, the old PCA) with phrases describing their lack of care or downright abuse as ‘unwitting’ and ‘accidental’.
The killer of Ian Tomlinson is not unknown to the police because it is the police - PC Simon Harwood. Alongside them we now have evidence of the IPCC, the CPS and now even the GMC and broadcasters such as the BBC being involved in a joint enterprise to deliberately pervert the course of justice.
Someone just got away with murder and we the people let them do it by accepting them urinating on our head and claiming its raining. The fact that they’ve handed us Patel as a dodgy umbrella to keep us a little dry in the storm does not mean that we should ignore the damage caused by the faeces they keep feeding us whilst claiming it is thunder and lightning.
Hopefully someone will make a donation to the Tomlinson family so they like the Jean Charles de Menezes family can attempt to pursue the case through the system. We all deserve to see those responsible for assaulting and subsequently killing innocent people face justice. But as I write this I can’t yet help think of Frank Ogboru, Christopher Alder, Mickey Powell, Sean Rigg, Derek Bennet, Roger Sylvester, Kebba Jobe, Shiji Lapite, Ibrahima Sey , Joy Garder, Ricky Bishop... the list is so long. As the recent recipient of a whitewashing IPCC report for a crime of police brutality against me that took place two years ago, I too know how for me and my family the notion of obtaining true justice seems so far away. Fortunately I am still alive to tell the tale, for those named above, they only have us.
If the African community in Britain had the resources, or one of the wealthy individuals within our community woke up with a conscience I would commission a research unit to re-investigate all the cases ever reviewed by Patel and other pathologists assigned to deaths in custody charges, exhuming the bodies if need be to get to the Truth.
Unfortunately since the demise of the New Nation we are without even a competent national newspaper for our community to highlight such concerns. We do not even have a healthy TV and radio network to disseminate more than music and entertainment (although thankfully VoxAfrica, Voice of Africa and Colourful who are all trying now exist). Instead I am limited to sharing my words on an internet site reaching a few thousand people a day in the hope of inspiring someone, anyone to take a stand, to do something, to stop being afraid and not let the unjust deaths of our Ancestors go unanswered.
Civil obedience in the face of ‘civilised’ injustice is a crime.
We can keep the fight alive in poems, songs, paintings, plays, articles, animations, sculptures even at work on the plantation in the form of strikes... for those seeking direct action we can march but I am not a fan of symbolic 'feel good' protests unless they involve deliberate acts of civil disobedience to remind the state and its employed thugs that it is we the people who truly has the power.
“As soon as you say the topic is civil disobedience, you are saying our problem is civil disobedience. That is not our problem.... Our problem is civil obedience. Our problem is the numbers of people all over the world who have obeyed the dictates of the leaders of their government and have gone to war, and millions have been killed because of this obedience. And our problem is that scene in All Quiet on the Western Front where the schoolboys march off dutifully in a line to war. Our problem is that people are obedient all over the world, in the face of poverty and starvation and stupidity, and war and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves, and all the while the grand thieves are running the country. That’s our problem.”
Extract from The Problem is Civil Obedience by Howard Zinn, 1970
As was said by the resistance fighter ‘Kyle Reese’ in the last Terminator Salvation movie, ‘the difference between us and machines [is that] we bury our dead.. [if you run] no-one is coming to bury you’. It may be a line from a fictional film but please consider the fact that if we don’t even have the courage or integrity to respect and fight for the rights and dignity of those who we claim to love, then what will happen to any and all of us when the state decides we are next to fall.
My thoughts are with the families and friends of all those killed by state violence still seeking justice.
Don’t be afraid and don't give up.
You are not alone.
Toyin Agbetu is a writer, film director, poet, and founder of Ligali.
External Links
Advice to charge police officer over Ian Tomlinson death ignoredSean Rigg CampaignTomlinson pathologist ‘irresponsible’ in earlier casesThe Problem is Civil Obedience by Howard Zinn, 1970Inquest Campaign
Police used “excessive force” against Frank OgboruNo IPCC justice for ‘unwitting’ murder of Christopher Alder
Recently in the news, many stories have been published asserting that the man responsible for the death of Ian Tomlinson on 1 April 2009 cannot be prosecuted because of the words written in a report by an ‘incompetent’ pathologist named Freddy Patel, 63. I will not insult your intelligence by engaging in the trivia being presented as mitigating factors by ‘journalists’ and spokespersons for the state over ‘blood’ and ‘fluid’.
Instead, let’s be blunt. Hiding behind this excuse is the Metropolitan Police Force and Paul Stephenson its commissioner, Simon Harwood, the officer who used violence to criminally assault the innocent Ian Tomlinson, Nick Hardwick whose Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) has a proven track record of eagerness to protect state interests before that of the public and the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and its ambitious director of public prosecutions, Keir Starmer QC. Why would any of these accept the behaviour of Harwood on that day as acceptable conduct for an officer of the law? Why has he not been prosecuted for manslaughter or at the very least ABH and faced disciplinary action removing him from public service? What of the other officers with him who have by their silence and inaction publicly condone his assault and also should be removed from public service.
I have taken the extraordinary decision to write in this manner on the topic because I believe in the need for a free media, I believe that both justice and democracy even the corrupt versions implemented here in the UK is best served by the presence of impartial bodies who investigate complaints, mistakes, successes and most important of all provide checks and counterbalances for all abuses of power by acting as observers of authorities through the process of providing critical analysis and informed comment. This is justice.
Yet over the past few weeks the overwhelming majority of the British media (except the Guardian) has shown little commitment to these values. They have in short colluded with the states attempts to protect itself from a legitimate charge of murder by presenting Freddie Patel as a sacrificial lamb to divert the public from focusing on its own culpability.
Let me declare right now. I have no sympathy for Freddie Patel, he most certainly needs to pay for his crimes, indeed I have already on numerous occasions made public my opposition to his use by the state as the man to send when they need a dodgy report to mask a death in custody or abuse by authority. The review of his cases by the General Medical Council (GMC) should not be limited to a couple of years, so many Africans have died in custody and had information revealing the true causes of death denied from grieving relatives seeking justice by corrupt medical practitioners such as Patel who have deliberately falsified records to get the state of the hook. It is my belief that Patel is very competent, he knows exactly what he is doing because he has been told and paid to do it.
For years Patel was a member of the Home Office’s network of accredited forensic pathologists. This was despite or perhaps because of his sabotage in 1999 of the Roger Sylvester family attempts to seek justice for the death of the 30-year-old African who died in police custody.
The Home Office register which is managed by the National Policing Improvement Agency also kept him on the list despite him not meeting the requirements to have a contract with a police force or being a member of a group practice which would have meant a team of three or more forensic pathologists would have been required to check his work. He was a lone unaccountable quack doctor who could be called and relied upon to quickly and quietly produce the reports needed to bury controversial cases.
Why else would the state employ him over and over again on these kind of cases unless they were sure he would deliver the results. Which leads us back to the question of culpability, you see if Patel is as ‘incompetent’ as is claimed by the GMC, then surely those who monitor, supervise and authorise his work must also share some of the blame in his alleged failings?
Unless of course he did not fail, unless if it hadn’t have been for the revelation of video footage exposing the police abuse during that fatal incident that led to Tomlinson’s death - business would have been resuming as normal. In most cases of police brutality the camera is typically ‘not working’, or ‘pointing in the wrong direction’. And even in cases where there is video footage, police force officers are excused their murderous behaviour by investigating bodies such as the IPCC (or its spiritual father, the old PCA) with phrases describing their lack of care or downright abuse as ‘unwitting’ and ‘accidental’.
The killer of Ian Tomlinson is not unknown to the police because it is the police - PC Simon Harwood. Alongside them we now have evidence of the IPCC, the CPS and now even the GMC and broadcasters such as the BBC being involved in a joint enterprise to deliberately pervert the course of justice.
Someone just got away with murder and we the people let them do it by accepting them urinating on our head and claiming its raining. The fact that they’ve handed us Patel as a dodgy umbrella to keep us a little dry in the storm does not mean that we should ignore the damage caused by the faeces they keep feeding us whilst claiming it is thunder and lightning.
No Justice, No Peace: Joy Gardner, Frank Ogboru, Sean Rigg, Kebba Jobe
Agents of the state, enemy of the people
Hopefully someone will make a donation to the Tomlinson family so they like the Jean Charles de Menezes family can attempt to pursue the case through the system. We all deserve to see those responsible for assaulting and subsequently killing innocent people face justice. But as I write this I can’t yet help think of Frank Ogboru, Christopher Alder, Mickey Powell, Sean Rigg, Derek Bennet, Roger Sylvester, Kebba Jobe, Shiji Lapite, Ibrahima Sey , Joy Garder, Ricky Bishop... the list is so long. As the recent recipient of a whitewashing IPCC report for a crime of police brutality against me that took place two years ago, I too know how for me and my family the notion of obtaining true justice seems so far away. Fortunately I am still alive to tell the tale, for those named above, they only have us.If the African community in Britain had the resources, or one of the wealthy individuals within our community woke up with a conscience I would commission a research unit to re-investigate all the cases ever reviewed by Patel and other pathologists assigned to deaths in custody charges, exhuming the bodies if need be to get to the Truth.
Unfortunately since the demise of the New Nation we are without even a competent national newspaper for our community to highlight such concerns. We do not even have a healthy TV and radio network to disseminate more than music and entertainment (although thankfully VoxAfrica, Voice of Africa and Colourful who are all trying now exist). Instead I am limited to sharing my words on an internet site reaching a few thousand people a day in the hope of inspiring someone, anyone to take a stand, to do something, to stop being afraid and not let the unjust deaths of our Ancestors go unanswered.
Civil obedience in the face of ‘civilised’ injustice is a crime.
We can keep the fight alive in poems, songs, paintings, plays, articles, animations, sculptures even at work on the plantation in the form of strikes... for those seeking direct action we can march but I am not a fan of symbolic 'feel good' protests unless they involve deliberate acts of civil disobedience to remind the state and its employed thugs that it is we the people who truly has the power.
“As soon as you say the topic is civil disobedience, you are saying our problem is civil disobedience. That is not our problem.... Our problem is civil obedience. Our problem is the numbers of people all over the world who have obeyed the dictates of the leaders of their government and have gone to war, and millions have been killed because of this obedience. And our problem is that scene in All Quiet on the Western Front where the schoolboys march off dutifully in a line to war. Our problem is that people are obedient all over the world, in the face of poverty and starvation and stupidity, and war and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves, and all the while the grand thieves are running the country. That’s our problem.”
Extract from The Problem is Civil Obedience by Howard Zinn, 1970
As was said by the resistance fighter ‘Kyle Reese’ in the last Terminator Salvation movie, ‘the difference between us and machines [is that] we bury our dead.. [if you run] no-one is coming to bury you’. It may be a line from a fictional film but please consider the fact that if we don’t even have the courage or integrity to respect and fight for the rights and dignity of those who we claim to love, then what will happen to any and all of us when the state decides we are next to fall.
My thoughts are with the families and friends of all those killed by state violence still seeking justice.
Don’t be afraid and don't give up.
You are not alone.
Toyin Agbetu is a writer, film director, poet, and founder of Ligali.
Toyin Agbetu
External Links
Advice to charge police officer over Ian Tomlinson death ignoredSean Rigg CampaignTomlinson pathologist ‘irresponsible’ in earlier casesThe Problem is Civil Obedience by Howard Zinn, 1970Inquest Campaign
Ligali is not responsible for the content of third party sites
Police used “excessive force” against Frank OgboruNo IPCC justice for ‘unwitting’ murder of Christopher Alder
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Should the Police who assaulted Ian Tomlinson be allowed to escape justice or are the media right in suggesting Freddy Patel bear the full responsibility for the injustice?Click here to speak out and share your perspective on this article.
Civil obedience in the face of ‘civilised’ injustice is a crime.
Toyin Agbetu, The Ligali Organisation
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