Summary
The so-called Colston Four did not deny pulling down a statue of the slave trader Edward Colston, but last week in Bristol they were cleared of causing criminal damage. They argued that they were protesting for racial equality, “on the right side of history”, and a jury found in their favour. The four were celebrated by crowds outside the courthouse, part of a tradition, it seemed, of activists bringing social change by whatever means necessary. Their critics, on the other hand, say this is an invitation to vandalism since it sends a message that it is OK to take whatever action you choose to promote your cause. If your right to protest allows you to march against injustice should it also extend to the right to glue yourself to a road or topple a statue?
This is the latest in a series of cases where juries have cleared protestors, despite there being no dispute about the facts. When the co-founder of Extinction Rebellion was acquitted in case with many parallels, he said it showed that “ordinary people, unlike the judiciary, are able to see the broader picture.” While a jury decision cannot legally set a precedent or influence another case, several MPs have expressed anger and concern about the implications of this verdict. They argue that the case should have been tried somewhere neutral and that the ‘expert witness’ should not have been an historian but a specialist in property rights. Who is right? Is history a legitimate defence after protestors smash up something that offends them? Are the rules being bent? And if so, is that what juries are for? With Jeremy Black, Jen Reid, Steven Barrett and Kirsty Brimelow.
Produced by Olive Clancy
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts. |
| 0:04.8 | Good evening. I remember when I lived in Bristol, you couldn't move for tributes to Edward Colston. |
| 0:10.0 | The main concert hall, a tower, half the street, several schools and even a local bread bun were named after him. |
| 0:16.5 | The 17th century tycoon was the philanthropist of his age, giving a modern day equivalent |
| 0:21.5 | of five and a half million pounds to good causes in the city. Money largely made out of trading |
| 0:26.9 | slaves, a Bristol speciality. The plaque on the statue that honoured him described him as one |
| 0:32.1 | of the most virtuous and wise sons of the city. The four people, all white as it happens, |
| 0:39.1 | accused of tearing down that statue and flinging it into the docks, did not deny that they did it, but were acquitted of |
| 0:44.0 | criminal damage by the jury who implicitly accepted the defence argument that its very presence |
| 0:49.0 | was an offence, amounting to hate crime. It was a verdict this created no end of fuss, as it suggests that in some cases at least, individual subjective conscience can excuse breaking the collective, objective law. Those that applaud the decision point to juries of the past who would not convict radical preachers or state whistleblowers, subsequently deemed in the phrase much used in this |
| 1:12.1 | latest trial to be on the right side of history. They tend not to mention the notorious reluctance |
| 1:17.7 | of juries in many parts of America until quite recently to find whites guilty of crimes against |
| 1:22.8 | blacks. So when does someone's convictions justify them breaking the law? And is that a decision that should be left to a jury? |
| 1:30.3 | That's our moral maze tonight. The panel, Melanie Phillips, social commentator at the Times, |
| 1:35.1 | the libertarian Marxist and editor at Navarra Media, Ash Sarka. Mona Siddiqui, professor of Islamic and inter-religious studies at Edinburgh University, |
| 1:43.5 | and the historian Tim Stanley. |
| 1:45.8 | Melanie, I'll start with you. It might not, strictly speaking, be the law, but was it, in your view, |
| 1:51.7 | justice, maybe of a historical kind? Well, in my view, in a free society, people should not |
| 1:57.8 | destroy other people's property. This is vandalism. |
| 2:04.9 | And where the justice system apparently endorses this, |
| 2:07.2 | I think society is on the road to anarchy. |
| 2:08.7 | Ash Sarka. |
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