XMAS MESSAGE FOR ALL JENGbA FRIENDS AND FOLLOWERS

Dear Families & Supporters of JENGbA

Just to let you know the December Newsletter and Xmas cards are going to be put in the post today. Thank you Sadif (Qhuram Awan's sister) for taking up mantle of last minute printing and then next day delivery to me which the lovely postman just delivered!  And Bernie Morrison (Kenneth Alexander supporter and my sister) who also managed to print off 100.  Thank you Patricia (Tirrel's Davis's mum) who is sitting in my kitchen as I type  hand writing 270 cards to all the JENGbA gals and guys inside. And thanks to Andy (Jack Dempsey's dad) who happened to have 300 Xmas cards in his loft (and they are lovely charity ones!)  and delievered them here the other night. 

We are very lucky that we have such great families that will pull together in support of JENGbA.  I have been trying to fund raise from 'outside' sources and any success in those endeavours will be shared with everyone.  I am confident we will get support because the campaign has achieved so much in such a short space of time.  However JENGbA is now officially out of funds!  The newsletter costs £94 alone in postage (that is to 270 but the number rises every month) and does not include printing as families such as Sadif, Deb Madden's, mine and the Braithewaites have helped. 

This is the wrong time of year to ask families, already streched with a loved one inside prison for money - however is there a right time?  Lots of people give up their time because we all know how important this campaign is to those inside.  Can everyone please donate at least £10 which will cover the postage costs to loved ones and others who have no supporters.  This is not a lot in the great scheme of things but it will keep us going.  And please, please can families fund raise as well!  Hold a JENGbA quiz night - contact loaded friends you may have - do a sponsered something or other -  anything because it also gets our message out there.  We are all in this together so let's join together and make 2012 the most challenging yet!!  Joint Enterprise is finally on the radar and we have to take the credit for that - now it is about the kind of noise that resulted in the Birmingham Six and the Guildford Four being released from prison.  That is what 2012 means for JENGbA and that will only come about if we ALL fight for it.

Gloria Morrison
JENGbA All the Way!!

JENGbA NEWSLETTER 11 NOW ONLINE

You can view and download it by clicking on this image...

JENGbA PRESS RELEASE: Fresh Evidence? Not in this Court!

Sheffield men denied retrial despite having evidence that could clear them

10 December 2011

Nigel Junior Ramsey, Denzil Ramsey, Levan Menzies and Michael Chattoo were convicted on 7 August 2009 of the murder of Tarek Chaiboub, who was killed when a sawn off shotgun was discharged at him in broad daylight on Spital Hill, Sheffield, on 11 July 2008.

Although Nigel Ramsey was in prison at the time, he was said to have ordered the killing using a mobile phone that had been smuggled in to him. There was no evidence to prove that any of the four had pulled the trigger, so all were linked to the killing through use of the joint enterprise law.

The four were said to be members of an ‘S3 postcode’ gang. They were alleged to be also responsible for a previous assault on Chaiboub carried out on 6 July, to which another defendant, Javan Galloway, pleaded guilty.

The four charged with murder were put on trial first, and two other individuals, Daud Ahmed and Abdi Rahman Ali, who were alleged to have assisted Denzil Ramsey with disposing of the weapon, were charged with perverting the course of justice and tried separately after the four were convicted.

A shotgun found hidden nearby in Osgathorpe Park was claimed by the police to be the weapon used in the murder, who linked it to all the defendants in both trials. The police commissioned Dr Robinson, a firearms expert, to examine the gun, and on the basis of his report, the prosecution were able to claim that this was the murder weapon. The four charged with murder commissioned their own firearms expert, Mr Dyson, to examine the evidence, but his findings gave their lawyers no grounds to challenge the prosecution evidence concerning the gun.

The only other evidence was that of mobile phone calls made between the defendants (although there is no record of what was said in any of the calls).

At the second trial, the other defendants commissioned a different firearms expert, Geoffrey Arnold, who said that the experts in the first trial had not done their work properly. As a result, they had missed opportunities that could have proved whether the gun was or was not the weapon used to kill the victim.

In addition, Mr Arnold found evidence sufficient to enable him to conclude that it was unlikely that it was the murder weapon. It had almost certainly not been discharged since the barrel had been sawn off, before the murder. Following his evidence at the second trial, the jury found the defendants Daud Ahmed and Abdi Rahman Ali not guilty.

The mother of two of the defendants in the murder trial attended the second trial. Hearing that a key item of prosecution evidence had been discredited, she informed her sons’ lawyers. They commissioned a further report from the defence expert used in the second trial, and lodged an appeal with the Court of Appeal. This appeal was heard on 8-9 December 2011 by judges Aiken, King and Stephens.

The appeal was entirely concerned with argument about whether the evidence of the defence expert from the second trial would count as fresh evidence. ‘Fresh evidence’, for the purposes of a criminal appeal, is evidence that was not available to the defence at the trial. Appeal court judges do not want their court to waste its time with hearing expert evidence that defence lawyers could have obtained, but failed to obtain at trials. They asked: was the evidence offered by the second expert genuinely fresh, or merely an opinion which differed from that of the first defence expert?

The judges did not call Mr Arnold so as to hear direct from him whether or not his evidence was fresh. They simply decided that the evidence was not ‘fresh’, and so the appeals were dismissed. They will give their reasons at a later date.

The families of Nigel and Denzil Ramsey, Levan Menzies and Michael Chattoo were outraged at what seems to be a gross injustice. At the later trial, exactly the same prosecution evidence that had been used to convict the four of murder had been discredited by a competent expert so that a jury could not find the defendants guilty. Surely they would be entitled to have this same evidence put before a new jury in a retrial of their case?

They had not had the chance at their own trial to use evidence that the prosecution expert had not followed established scientific procedures and as a result deprived them of the chance to prove that the gun shown to the jury could not have been the murder weapon.

Further, the jury that tried them had not had the chance to hear evidence showing the gun was unlikely to have been the murder weapon, nor did they have the guidance of a competent expert who could explain clearly why even the evidence produced by the prosecution showed that the gun was not the murder weapon.

For example: when a shotgun is fired, plastic wadding is discharged along with metal shot. Usually marks (striations) are made on the wadding which are characteristic of the particular gun that fires them. The wadding found on the victim showed no striations. But the wadding from a whole series of test firings by the prosecution expert showed consistent striations. This gun always left these particular marks. So it is highly unlikely that the wadding found on the victim was discharged by the gun exhibited at the murder trial.

Lord Justice Sir Richard John Pearson Aikens told us that the Court had decided not to admit this evidence on grounds of “expediency and justice”. “Expediency” is clear enough: their lordships do not want their valuable time taken up with appeals based on expert evidence. But “justice”? We are unable to see where anything we could recognise as justice comes into their considerations.

And if the four lads from Burngreave jailed with minimum terms of 20 – 35 years conclude that justice has been denied them and maybe put forever beyond their reach, we could not contradict them.

COMMITTEE ON THE REFORM OF JOINT ENTERPRISE VIDEO

HALDANE SOCIETY - SPEECH BY GLORIA MORRISON (JENGbA)

Gloria's speech to the Haldane Society on 6 December 2011 is available HERE

JENGbA PRESS RELEASE - RESPONSE TO HRAG & LORD JUDGE

PRESS RELEASE - JENGbA (Joint Enterprise: Not Guilty by Association) 7 December 2011
 

Lord Judge said: "It seems to me, perhaps the real problem is with the law of murder itself.

 

"It's particularly difficult and troublesome when more than one person is said to be involved, a joint enterprise murder.

 

"Who is guilty of murder when four people, three people, surround somebody?  The one who kicks, the one who suddenly produces the knife - the offensive weapon that causes the death - the one who eggs on the one who's got the knife, the one who says to him, 'For God's sake...'?" he added.

 

"It's complicated too by the various defences.  These are all extremely complicated when they're put together in the one case."

 

(Extracted from http://t.co/hPw2HYCF)

 

This is the reaction of campaign group JENGbA (Joint Enterprise: Not Guilty by Association) to the report of the Homicide Review Advisory Group, (6 December 2011).  The report recommends that ‘mandatory’ life sentences are replaced with Judges having the right to decide on sentences, depending on the circumstances of the case. 

The Homicide Review Advisory Group is made up of Judges, Academics and QCs.  It suggests the system does not allow for sentences to match individual crimes.  JENGbA's concern is that instead Joint Enterprise allows for anyone at the scene of a crime, or with an association with the perpetrator to be prosecuted in the same way and then sentenced as the same, and does so with little or no regard to their actual culpability.

This is an important part of the debate about sentencing.  If there was proper discretion, then Judges would not have to give a life sentence for cases of 'association'.  JENGbA is actively campaigning to change the law on Joint Enterprise.  A law that means innocent bystanders can, and have been dragged into serious criminal cases merely by some association, and not necessarily a criminal association to the perpetrator.  The public are not aware of this law and, therefore, do not understand how it is being used or that in its current state is convicting innocent people.  The Nuffield Report released earlier this year also goes someway in explaining this.

Trials become overly complicated as all defendants are put together on the same charge, often leaving juries with no choice but to convict all the defendants, even when it is obvious the offence was committed by a single perpetrator.  Education and debate is crucial and campaigners believe the issue can no longer be ignored.  As it stands it leaves a heavy and unnecessary burden on the taxpayer, destroys the lives of families and leaves communities with no trust in the Police or the Justice system.

 

Gloria Morrison, JENGbA Coordinator says

 

"The UK's most senior judge has expressed concerns relating to joint enterprise convictions.  JENGbA is representing prisoners who have been convicted under joint enterprise and their families.  We have been contacted by over 270 prisoners many of whom are serving life sentences for something they did not do, did not foresee was going to happen nor intend to happen, but have been convicted by an archaic law that is being abused to get convictions and not justice.  The public are NOT aware that there are people in prison serving disproportionate sentences for an offence where there was no evidence to convict them so joint enterprise is used as a catch all for convictions".  

 

FOR MORE INFORMATION PLEASE CALL

Gloria Morrison on 07709115793 or Janet Cunliffe on 07729033890

www.jointenterprise.co

JENGbA & LAI Meeting in LONDON - Tues 13th December, 7.30pm

JENGbA and London Against Injustice are holding a joint meeting at 7.30pm on Tuesday 13th December, Milfords Pub, 1 Milford Lane (off The Strand), London.

All welcome.

Milfords, Milford La., Strand, London

Directions and map HERE

JENGbA & INNOCENT MEETINGS - Wed 7th December, 6pm, Royal Oak Pub, OLDHAM

JENGbA is holding a meeting at 6pm on WED 7th DECEMBER, at the Royal Oak pub in Union Street, Oldham OL1 1EN.  (This immediately precedes the regular monthly meeting of INNOCENT which starts at 7pm in the same venue.)

Anyone who has been affected by Joint Enterprise or wishes to learn more about our campaign is welcome.

Directions available HERE

Royal Oak, Union St, Oldham

Haldane Society Human Rights Lectures 2011 - 2012 Tuesday 6th December: Guilt by Association: Criminalisation through joint enterprise law

Speakers: 

Gloria Morrison: campaign co-ordinator for JENGbA - Joint Enterprise Not Guilty by Association. JENGbA represents the families and supporters who have loved ones convicted under joint enterprise. JENGbA have been contacted by 260 prisoners claiming have been wrongfully convicted. She is a mother, grandmother, writer and teacher. 

Simon Natas: solicitor advocate and senior partner at Irvine Thanvi Natas solicitors in East London. Specialisist in criminal defence law and legal adviser to JENGBA. Simon recently co-authored a submission for the purposes of the Commons Justice Committee inquiry on joint enterprise.  

6.30pm, College of Law, 14 Store Street, London WC1E 7DE (Goodge St tube).  

Free admission. £10 charge to practitioners requiring CPD points.

Demonstration to protest against wrongful convictions and failure of the Criminal Cases Review Commission to put them right

Tuesday 6th December 2011

 

The march will start at Fazeley Street, Digbeth, Birmingham, at the Moor Street end. Everyone should converge from 11.30am to start off at 12 noon.

The proposed route is as follows, we should all walk up to Moor Street and cross over by the pelican lights up to where the bull is and continue onto the High Street, turn left into Union Street and continue towards the direction of Corporation where we cross into Cherry Street, continue towards St Phillips Church where we turn right then left into St Phillips Place and we shall stop outside No. 5 which is where CCRC is located.

Can everyone make sure that they are wrapped up WARMLY just in case the weather changes. Please come along with your banners, 'T' shirts, and please spread the word.

 

Organised by West Midlands Against Injustice 

http://www.innocent.org.uk/wmai/WestMidlands.html

JENGbA Meeting in London - Tues 15.11.11, 7pm

JENGbA is meeting at 7pm on Tuesday 15th November, Milfords Pub, 1 Milford Lane (off The Strand), London.

All welcome.

Milfords, Milford La., Strand, London

Directions and map HERE

JENGbA Newsletter 10 Now Online

Click on the image to get JENGbA's latest newsletter...

Joint Enterprise Law under scrutiny - BBC Newsnight Feature

This thing they call Joint Enterprise

This thing they call Joint Enterprise.

I can't believe I'm doing time
locked away for another man's crime
This thing they call Joint Enterprise
Rips apart families - ruins lives.

It won't matter that you didn't join in
with this law you will never win
This thing they call Joint Enterprise
They will convict you with their lies.

All I did was answer my phone
for this they dragged me from my home.
This thing they call Joint Enterprise
Is this enough for me to stand trial?

I didn't do it, everyone said,
but they will listen to the prosecution instead.
This thing they call Joint Enterprise
I didn't know - I can't read minds.

They call me a murderer - but it wasn't me
It wasn't me fault I couldn't see
This thing they call Joint Enterprise
Can see you convicted for the most serious crimes.

It won't matter to them it wasn't you,
they'll still find you guilty too!
This thing they call Joint Enterprise
For another person's actions you'll be sentenced to life

(Contributed by Ashleigh Towers)

The Amazing Art of Jamal Parchment Folarin - 3

More amazing art by Jamal - shared with us here with his kind permission

Use of joint enterprise law under scrutiny

By Liz Mackean BBC Newsnight

The joint enterprise law has caused resentment on the streets

The law of Joint Enterprise allows the courts to impose a life sentence on people even if they took no direct part in an offence.
People can be convicted of serious offences, even murder, whether or not they wielded a knife or threw a punch.
The police say the law is a valuable weapon and deterrent and its use has helped them tackle gang culture and violence.
But campaigners see it as a way of locking up innocent people, some of whom just happen to be at the scene of a crime.
In the absence of any data, a committee of MPs is now trying to establish how widely the law is being used.
Perhaps most famously the law was used to convict Derek Bentley of the shooting of a police officer because he said to his accomplice Christopher Craig - who actually pulled the trigger - "Let him have it."
Savage attack
Joint enterprise was also used to convict three teenagers of the murder of Garry Newlove, whose assault by drunken youths in 2007 was seen as proof of David Cameron's broken Britain.
The coroner found Mr Newlove died from a single kick, but all three, including Jordan Cunliffe who was 15 at the time, are serving life for murder.

Garry Newlove's killers were convicted under joint enterprise

Mr Newlove's widow Helen has said his sentence is entirely justified:
"Life should mean life. If you are saying Jordan Cunliffe did not attack my husband, he certainly stood next to that body and watch them beating and beating. You're as guilty as a person, because you are watching that act, you are guilty of that act."
But Cunliffe's mother believes the joint enterprise law is being used to convict those only peripherally involved in a crime - or as she says, in her son's case - simply in the wrong place.
Commander Simon Foy of the Metropolitan Police has been responsible for taking the message of joint enterprise into London schools to warn youngsters what can happen if they get involved with the wrong crowd.
"I make no apologies for how we have used this as a principle to get across what we hope is a positive, constructive, educative message," he says. "The most important thing we can do in these events is to stop someone getting stabbed or killed."
Police are confident the law is helping to keep young people away from trouble and has even had an impact on levels of knife crime in London.
'Being targeted'
But there is a very different view of it in the dense estates where gang culture has flourished:
"From what I have seen and from cases I know with joint enterprise they do spend a lot of time building up a case but it seems to be easier to build a case of joint enterprise, it gets rid of the whole guilty before proven innocent thing," says Yohanes Scarlett, a student who grew up an estate in West London. "It's almost like you are guilty now prove to us are innocent, it's a lot harder to do that."

Some believe the alienation caused youths to take part in the summer riots

Yohanes says that young people there think they are being targeted:
"I think a lot of people have experienced JE either personally, or they have friends who have gone through it, so it starts making people not trust the police as much - they feel police are specifically targeting their communities."
Kumani, a local youth worker, says many young people are scared of being simply in the wrong place and falling foul of the law.
He says it has caused resentment towards the police and an alienation which he thinks partly explains why some people took part in the summer riots.
"I know young boys who have been hit with a joint enterprise charge and, having been in the criminal system at the age of 13 or 14 will come out at the age of 26 and have spent most of their adult life in prison."
Kumani introduces me to several young people who all believe that joint enterprise is responsible for sending the innocent to jail. And campaigners agree with them.
The campaign group Jengba says it is fighting 256 cases. Of those, 215 prisoners are serving life for murder.
Twenty-five percent were under 21 when convicted and 59% are from black and ethnic minority communities.
The police insist the law is applied in a considered way. While acknowledging that its use has increased, they have no data on how many people have been charged under it.
The Ministry of Justice and Crown Prosecution Service also keep no figures to show how many people are charged under joint enterprise, so one of the first tasks of the Justice Select Committee of MPs will be to establish how widely the law is being used.
Potentially more decisive will a Supreme Court judgement due later this year where the way joint enterprise is used to take on gangs is very much on trial.

BBC 2 Newsnight 1.11.11 - feature on Joint Enterprise

"And we have a film from Liz Mackean about the joint enterprise law, used by police to tackle gang violence, which is to be investigated by MPs after claims it is criminalising hundreds of innocent and mainly young people."

Pastel drawing by Samantha Joseph

Rose, by Samantha Joseph

Samantha sent this lovely pastel drawing of a rose to JENGbA

Joint Enterprise: Committee to hold final evidence session

27 October 2011

The Justice Select Committee will hold its final evidence session into this inquiry on Tuesday 1 November when evidence will be heard from:

At 10.30am
Professor Jeremy Horder, Professor of Criminal Law, King’s College London
At 11.15am
Ministry of Justice:
Crispin Blunt MP, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State
Keir Hopley, Deputy Director, Criminal Law and Legal Policy.
The session will take place in Committee Room 5

The session will be open to the public on a first come, first served basis as seating is limited and there is no system of tickets or advance booking. Please advise security staff that you are attending a committee meeting and they will direct you. You should allow at least 20 minutes to go through security.

HOC JUSTICE COMMITTEE HEARING ON JOINT ENTERPRISE

Joint Enterprise: Committee's first evidence session

20 October 2011

The Justice Select Committee will hold its first evidence session in this inquiry on Tuesday 25 October when evidence will be heard from:

At 10.30am

• Keir Starmer QC, Director of Public Prosecutions

At 11.15am

• Jean Taylor and
• Christine Jones, Families Fighting for Justice

At 11.40am

• Gloria Morrison, and
• Dr Andrew Green, Joint Enterprise-Not Guilty by Association, JENGba

The session will take place in Committee Room 8
The session will be open to the public on a first come, first served basis as seating is limited and there is no system of tickets or advance booking. Please advise security staff that you are attending a committee meeting and they will direct you. You should allow at least 20 minutes to go through security.
Further information

• Justice Committee
• Visiting Parliament: Watch Committees
• About Parliament: Select Committees

JENGbA | Birmingham | October 8th 2011

JENGbA NEWSLETTER 9 NOW ONLINE

You can view, print and download it from here

JENGbA NEWSLETTER 8 NOW ONLINE

You can view, download and print the latest newsletter from here

JENGbA PETITION FORM NOW AVAILABLE ONLINE

You can view, download and print the JENGbA petition form for reform of JE here

Please send completed forms to JENGbA at the address on the top!

JENGbA NEWSLETTER 7 - JUNE 2011 PUBLISHED

You can read and download the latest newsletter by clicking on the image below...

JOINT ENTERPRISE FILM (2011)

You can view and download JENGbA's new film here

Or watch it on YouTube in 2 parts...

 

JENGbA FILM SHOWING - 7pm, 18 JUNE - SHEFFIELD

You are invited to the showing of our newly released film JOINT ENTERPRISE: NOT GUILTY BY ASSOCIATION, at Christ Church, 257 Pitsmoor Rd, Sheffield, on Saturday 18 June, 7 - 8.30pm

 
Joint Enterprise: Not Guilty by Association (JENGbA) is a campaigning organisation whose aims are to change the application of the Joint Enterprise Law and to overturn convictions of innocent people wrongly convicted due to the admission of inadequate and misleading evidence in trials. We are currently supporting over 200 prisoners who are protesting their innocence after being convicted under the Joint Enterprise Law. The film will be followed by a Q&A Session attended by friends and family members representing the wrongfully convicted.

Google Map here

Public Transport information here

JENGBA NEWSLETTER 6 RELEASED

Click here to view in Google Docs

Cool pic by Matty Franklin - JENGbA campaigner

JENGbA NEWSLETTER 5

CLICK ON IMAGE TO VIEW ONLINE...

JENGbA Newsletter 5

JENGbA MEETING 26.04.11 IN HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT - HOW TO GET THERE

The meeting will now take place in the Grand Committee Room in the Palace of Westminster on Tuesday, 26th April 2011, 3-5pm. 

Click here for a map.

Directions

By Rail

Nearest Stations are Charing Cross, Victoria and Waterloo (20-30 minutes walk).

Underground

Westminster (Circle, District and Jubilee Lines).

By Bus

Buses 3, 11, 12, 24, 53, 87, 88, 148, 159, 211, 453, N2, N3, N11, N87, N136, N155, N191 & N381 all stop nearby.

Use of public Transport is advised as the Abingdon Green car park is often full and meter parking is expensive and scarce.

Please use the St. Stephen's Entrance to the Palace of Westminster (number 7 on the map) and ask to be directed to the Grand Committee Room. 

The Grand Committee Room looks like this...
 

JENGbA - House of Commons Meeting Tuesday 26th April

JENGbA - House of Commons Meeting Tuesday 26th April, 2-4pm, Committee Room 14, Chair: Bruce Kent...more details to follow...contact JENGbA for info www.jointenterprise.co

INVITATION TO JENGbA'S NEW FILM

Click on the poster to view full size and to print it...

JOINT ENTERPRISE VIDEO USED BY MET IN SCHOOLS

This video was originally commissioned by the MET then used by BBC Panorama in its own documentary on Joint Enterprise.