http://www.bigissueinthenorth.com/2013/03/there-is-no-way-of-knowing-how-much-damage-jenner-caused/7622
‘There is no way of knowing how much damage Jenner
caused’
The police spy recently revealed to be Mark Jenner worked on
a number of political activists' campaigns, reveals Mark Metcalf
'There
is no way of knowing how much damage Jenner caused’ - Big Issue North
Big Issue North 11 March 2013
I now know the name of the Metropolitan Police officer
who was employed to spy on the protest group in which I was one of the key
organisers in the 1990s. Thanks to his former partner Alison (not her real
name) and the Guardian it has been established that the man I knew during my
time at the Colin Roach Centre (CRC) in Hackney as Mark Cassidy is Mark Jenner
of the Met’s special demonstration squad (SDS).
Jenner’s name was revealed when Alison gave evidence to the
Home Affairs Select Committee inquiry into undercover policing, his police role
confirmed by the Guardian on 1 March. He is one of 11 undercover police
officers publicly identified. Nine of them had sexual relations with activists
mainly from environmental groups.
The officers’ actions began unravelling in 2011 when the
Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) dropped criminal proceedings against six people
facing charges related to a conspiracy to sabotage a coal-fired power station
at Ratcliffe-on-Soar, Nottinghamshire. The convictions of another 20 activists
were later quashed after it was revealed that long-term police spy PC Mark
Kennedy had acted as an agent provocateur within the environmental movement.
Further allegations of undercover police officers acting beyond their
authorisation then surfaced and we now know they were given the names of
infants who had died many years previously.
The Metropolitan Police has now been ordered to investigate
under Operation Herne how SDS officers created and maintained false identities
while undercover.
After Kennedy became public knowledge I wrote a piece for
The Big Issue in the North in January 2011 about the man I knew then as
Cassidy. Although I had worked Jenner out many years beforehand it was only
after he had been active in high profile campaigns in which members of CRC were
involved. The centre was opened in 1993 and named after a young black man
shot dead inside Stoke Newington Police Station in 1983. It combined a number
of unfunded local groups, including the Hackney Community Defence Organisation
(HCDA), which had uncovered serious corruption amongst the local police, with
Panorama and World in Action undercover investigations confirming some officers
were involved in drug dealing.
CRC was burgled, with equipment vandalised and a computer
stolen. Cash was left undisturbed
HCDA’s work overturned many convictions and a database of
police officers known to have complaints or convictions against them was
compiled. The Defendants Information Services (DIS) was registered despite
objections from the Association of Chief Police Officers. On 23 December
1994, a day when HCDA had organised a picket of Stoke Newington Police Station
to demand action over the death of Oluwasijibomo Lapite in police custody, CRC
was burgled, with equipment vandalised and a computer stolen. Cash was left
undisturbed. An HCDA spokesperson told the Hackney Gazette: “It was the
work of Special Branch, whose real target was a new database service.” In fact
DIS was run from a different location.
Early the following year a Liverpudlian who identified
himself as Mark Cassidy came into the centre to say he had seen TV coverage of
the annual commemoration event for those who had died at the hands of the local
police. The 1995 guest speaker was civil rights lawyer Gareth Pierce.“Cassidy”
quickly became active in most of the centre’s political life, including writing
for our internal bulletin. When a magazine sold to the public was launched his
suggestion to call it RPM – revolutions per minute – was agreed. He attended
members’ meetings and was privy to confidential information on hundreds of
people’s policing cases, including where police officers were charged with
unlawful imprisonment and conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.
Jenner was privy to confidential information on hundreds
of people’s policing cases
Graham Smith, a Manchester University lecturer, consultant
on police complaints to the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human
Rights and an international expert on police accountability, says: “I am
concerned that undercover officer Mark Jenner participated in an organisation
that supported law abiding citizens who were involved in legal proceedings
against the Metropolitan Police.”
CRC, with Jenner much involved, was also central to the
campaign by businessman Malcolm Kennedy to prove he had not killed Patrick
Quinn in 1990. Quinn had been battered to death – his injuries included 33
fractured ribs – in Hammersmith Police Station. Convicted of murder, Kennedy
was released after his conviction was quashed when the World in Action
programme, uncovered new witnesses in the police station, giving grounds for
appeal.
At his retrial Kennedy was cleared of murder but convicted
of manslaughter. After receiving the backing of 65 MPs when a parliamentary
motion supporting him was tabled he was granted further leave to appeal.
Kennedy lost his appeal in 1996 but as a free man he has continued to campaign
to have his conviction overturned. He alleges that as a result he has
suffered constant harassment by the police, making it almost impossible for him
to earn a living from his removals business.
“This may have perverted the course of justice.”
Kennedy says: “I find it eerie that Jenner was involved at
the CRC during the period of my 1996 appeal when he was privy to campaign
strategies and confidential information. This may have perverted the course of
justice. Without a proper investigation there is no way of knowing how much
damage Jenner caused to me.”
Claiming to be a building worker himself, Jenner supported
others victimised by their construction industry employers. The Building
Workers Group (BWG) had decided to put pickets on workplaces where deaths had
occurred. Three people a week were being killed on UK building sites and the
aim was to damage the employers’ profits and force them to take action to
prevent such tragedies. Where workers refused to cross a picket line it was
maintained. However, where the majority went to work the others were persuaded
to join them in order to prevent victimisation.
The initiative was a direct challenge to anti-trade union
laws. Jenner attended picket lines, wrote for the BWG newspaper and came into
contact with many union site representatives.
When UCATT officer Dominic Hehir sued BWG and union member
Brian Higgins for libel over allegations he was failing to support members, a
defence campaign was established – and Jenner became the chair. Although the
campaign was successful the time taken up on Higgins’ defence meant there was
little in reserve to picket sites. Those involved felt it was a hollow
victory. Higgins, a blacklisted building worker, says: “I am appalled to
discover ‘Mark Cassidy’ was actually an undercover police officer who used his
cover as a building worker to infiltrate organisations the state does not like.
It is like some Orwellian nightmare and it is surely time for decency, justice
and democracy for blacklisted workers.”
Higgins is one of 3,213 building workers’ names on the
Consulting Association (CA) database used by 44 building companies to vet
potential new recruits over the last four decades. His file contained seven
pages from RPM.
Many of those on the CA list were “not recommended for
employment”. Their details were revealed after the Information Commissioner’s
Office closed down CA and its owner, Ian Kerr, was found guilty in 2009 of
breaching the Data Protection Act.
The Blacklist Support Group has established that some of the
information supplied by CA came from the police or security services. They have
lodged a formal complaint to the Investigatory Powers Tribunal –
the security services watchdog – and want an
investigation about the possible involvement of MI5 and other
sections of the security services in blacklisting.
Spokesperson Dave Smith says: “We now want to know why an
undercover cop posing as a building worker turned up on picket lines and at
campaign meetings, the details of which were discovered in the CA files. Were
names of building workers or any information gathered by this police officer
passed on to the CA blacklist? It sure as hell looks dodgy.”
I began to ensure his information-gathering opportunities
were reduced
By the middle of 1997 I had become suspicious. Jenner had
failed to recognise any Tranmere fans when I watched with him the games of what
was supposedly his favourite football team. On a union delegation to Ireland he
walked down the fiercely Protestant Shankhill Road even though he was a
Catholic. He had volunteered to take his van to Ireland, despite knowing it
would result in his details being recorded by the security services.
It was all a bit odd but, unwilling to challenge him
directly, I shared my concerns with those closest to me and began to ensure his
information-gathering opportunities were reduced. By the end of 1997 Jenner’s
involvement in the CRC had lessened. He still attended some events but mainly
to report on his activities within Anti-Fascist Action (AFA), a militant group
that had successfully physically confronted the BNP. AFA member Patrick Hayes
had been convicted of causing two explosions in the South East on behalf of the
IRA in 1993 and the state was certain to be interested in preventing any such
actions in the future. Hayes was sentenced to 30 years imprisonment and later
released under the Good Friday Agreement. It may be that AFA was always
Jenner’s main intended target.
A concerned Alison rang his workplace, only to discover
he had departed a few years previously
CRC had closed by the time Jenner disappeared from his home
with Alison in April 2000. In the months beforehand he had acted suspiciously
and had slept on the settee in his clothes. Alison had discovered a credit card
in his real name, which he claimed to have bought for £50 to obtain petrol
dishonestly.
A concerned Alison rang his workplace, only to discover he
had departed a few years previously. Yet he had continued during this time to
leave for work at 6.30am. Visits to a counsellor to discuss his reluctance to
have children were abandoned without him mentioning his family. We now know
Jenner was married.
When she discovered my reservations about Jenner, Alison
contacted me in 2001 to reveal she had checked his claim that his father had
been killed in a car accident in Birkenhead in 1975. The deaths register showed
this tale was untrue – one more lie in a very long list.
The Home Affairs Select Committee has asked to be updated
every three months on Operation Herne and Theresa May, the home secretary, has
promised the Independent Police Complaints Commission will “investigate serious
and sensitive allegations”. This may include some from me as I am examining the
possibility that a former girlfriend who I lived with may have been in the SDS.
Smith says: “In addition to an examination of past
undercover policing arrangements it is important that an independent and
impartial investigation is conducted into the purpose of undercover operations.
If there is evidence that undercover police officers like Jenner and his
superiors were engaged in a conspiracy to pervert the course of justice, that
evidence should be forwarded to the CPS, which will have to decide whether to
bring criminal proceedings.”
Photo: Mark Jenner, or Cassidy, as he was known to the
author and fellow activists
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