VICTORY! Fracking protestors freed!
The court of appeal has quashed the sentences of three protesters
jailed for blocking access to a fracking site, calling them “manifestly
excessive”.The lord chief justice, Sir Ian Burnett, said: “We have concluded
that an immediate custodial sentence in the case of these defendants was
manifestly excessive.”The activists, Simon Blevins, 26, Richard Roberts, 36, and Rich
Loizou, 31, were jailed after a four-week trial last month led to their
convictions for causing a public nuisance for a protest at Cuadrilla’s
Preston New Road site in Lancashire. The decision means that Blevins,
Roberts and Loizou will be released immediately from Preston prison.The packed courtroom erupted with applause and some supporters began singing after the decision was announced.
Loizou’s father, Platon, said: “Justice has been done today. We
shouldn’t be here in the first place, but justice has been done.”The three men had climbed on to lorries outside Cuadrilla’s fracking
site in Preston in a protest last July that lasted almost 100 hours. The
three, who were the first environmental protesters to be imprisoned
since 1932, were convicted of public nuisance after a trial at Preston
crown court.
GREAT NEWS!!!!
Court quashes fracking protesters’ ‘excessive’ jail sentences
QueerAnarchism 