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Sussex police were yesterday accused of using mass arrests and draconian bail conditions as a means of criminalising lawful anti-fracking protests.
A series of trials involving protestors, including the Green MP Caroline Lucas, resulted in only 29 convictions. Lydia Dagostino, a solicitor who represented many of the accused, told The Guardian:
In the third of a series of posts in advance of this week's How Violent is Britain? conference Dr Will Jackson of Liverpool John Moores University writes about the 'out of control' policing of anti-fracking protestors.
Ben Bowling, Professor of Criminology and Criminal Justice at King's College London, gives a cautious welcome to the Home Secretary's proposals to reform stop and search.
Police in England and Wales used tasers more than 10,000 in 2013, The Guardian reports, an increase of 27 per cent in a year.
Figures from the annual Police use of taser statistics also show that taser use has increased dramatically year on year since 2009, when they were used just over 3,000 times.
A ‘crisis care concordat’ signed by 22 national organisations, including the Department of Health, the Home Office and the charity Mind, says police custody should not be used because mental health services are not available, and police cars and other vehicles should not be used as ambulances to transfer patients.
Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg, said
‘It's unacceptable that there are incidents where young people and even children can end up in a police cell because the right mental health service isn't available to them’.
Police stations 'should stop being used' as places to detain mentally ill people, according to one of Britain's most senior police officers, reports the BBC.
More than 14,700 police are now armed with tasers. Figures due out tomorrow will show that in 2009 there were 3,500 taser deployments, rising to more than 7,000 a year in 2010 and 2011. The police have now been instructed to refrain from using the weapons at point blank range after a surge in complaints, reports The Guardian and The Times.
This initial assessment of criminal justice resources, staffing and workloads was carried out during October and November 2008 by the Centre for Crime and Justice Studies for a group of professional bodies and trade unions representing those who work in the criminal justice system.
