smashEDO

9th January 2007

Anti-Arms Trade Campaigners launch new Legal Attack against Factory’s Lawyer

Smash EDO Press Release

Contact Andrew Beckett or Sarah Johnson For more
Details

Email - smashedopress@yahoo.co.uk, tel 07875708873

www.smashedo.org.uk

Anti arms trade campaigners have handed in 7 official complaints to the law society regarding the conduct of Timothy Lawson-Cruttenden, the solicitor who represented EDO MBM in their failed attempt to gain a civil injunction against protesters at their Brighton factory.

In March 2005 Mr Lawson-Cruttenden, on behalf of the Brighton arms manufacturers, began proceedings aimed at preventing anybody protesting within a kilometre of the factory (save for at at a designated time in a designated ‘protest area’). The action sparked a year long high-court battle against campaigners ending in EDO MBM dropping the case at a cost of at least a million pounds (see previous press release).

Throughout the case Mr Lawson-Cruttenden had unprecedented access to confidential material held on campaigners by Sussex Police. The complaints to the law society cover the manner in which he obtained this disclosure. Separate complaints are underway against Sussex Police for the biased political policing surrounding protest at the factory (see previous press release).

The complaints also cover the appropriation by Mr Lawson-Cruttenden of a personal diary belonging to a defendant in the high court proceedings. Chris Osmond, owner of the diary said ‘shortly before the high court case collapsed it was revealed that EDO’s lawyer was in possession of my diary, and may have intended to use it to his benefit in court, it is deeply worrying to think that an officer of the court would go to these lengths to stifle peaceful protest’.

Sarah Johnson, press spokeswoman for Smash EDO, said ‘throughout EDO MBM’s attempt to stifle freedom of expression in Brighton Timothy Lawson-Cruttenden abused his position as a solicitor and an officer of the court by entering into intrusive investigations into campaigners’ personal data. He was assisted in this by Sussex Police who had an unhealthy relationship with EDO MBM and an interest in ending the protests’.

If the complaints are upheld Mr Lawson-Cruttenden could be struck off the list, losing his right to practice as a solicitor.

Mr Lawson-Cruttenden is the main architect of the Protection from Harassment Act 1997. The law was originally brought in to protect people from stalkers. He has pioneered the use of the act by corporations to restrict protest on the basis that corporations are being stalked by campaigners. Mr Lawson-Cruttenden has represented over 20 corporations, including Huntingdon Life Sciences, against animal rights activists.

Andrew Beckett, spokesman for Smash EDO, said ‘the use of the act by corporations to restrict protest is contrary to articles 10 and 11 of the Human Rights Act, its use in this way forms part of the current attack on freedom to protest in the UK’ .

Smash EDO demonstrate every Wednesday at EDO, 4-6pm, on Home Farm Road, Brighton

Notes for Journalists

Brighton & Hove is a UN Peace Messenger City

The injunction referred to was served under the 1997 Protection from Harassment Act (originally designed to protect women from stalkers) and is the first of its kind directed at activists outside of the animal rights movement. Crucially it is a civil injunction but carries criminal penalties. It affects anyone deemed to be a protestor. Initially EDO/MBM requested a large "exclusion zone" comprising the whole of Home Farm Industrial Estate.

They and Sussex police also wanted to limit demonstrations to two and a half hours, with less thanten people who had to be silent. Judge Gross refusedto impose these conditions at the initial hearing of an interim injunction, which was put in place in the period before the full trial to be heard at the High court in London from November 21st. In his summing up he said, "The right to freedom of expression is jealously guarded in English law" and consequently refused to impose the requested limits on size, timing or noise made at demonstrations. He also said that he doubted that protesters were 'stalking' employees of EDO MBM.

EDO MBM Technologies Ltd are the sole UK subsidiary of huge U.S arms conglomerate EDO Corp, which was recently named No. 10 in the Forbes list of 100 fastest growing companies. They supply bomb release mechanisms to the US and UK armed forces amongstothers. They supply crucial components for Raytheon's Paveway guided bomb system, widely used in the "Shock and Awe" campaign in Iraq .

EDO also withdrew a threatened libel action against Indymedia over being named as "warmongers".

Lawson-Cruttenden & Co
Solicitors firm working for EDO have been instrumental in developing the Protection of Harassment Act 1997 from a measure designed to safeguard individuals to a corporate charter to make inconvenient protest illegal. Theyhave pioneered to use of injunctions to create large "exclusion zones". They have secured numerous injunctions against anti-vivisection and anti-GM protestors.

Campaign against EDO MBM
People involved in the anti-EDO campaign include, but are not limited to: local residents, the Brighton Quakers, peace activists, anti-capitalists, Palestine Solidarity groups, human rights groups, trade unionists, academics and students. The campaign started in August 2004 with a peace camp. It's avowed aim is to expose EDO MBM and their complicity in war crimes and to remove them from Brighton.