Alfie Meadows and Zak King found not guilty - two years, three months, and three trials later

The following is a press statement from Defend the Right to Protest, who have tirelessly supported Zak, Alfie and other victims of police violence and harassment.

“The struggle for justice for my son has finally begun” (Susan Matthews, mother of Alfie Meadows).

Today a jury has delivered a unanimous verdict acquitting Alfie Meadows and Zak King of violent disorder. Alfie and Zak were amongst thousands of students who took to the streets against the tripling of university fees, cuts to higher education and education maintenance allowance on 9 December 2010.

Zak and Alfie have had to wait more than two years and go through the ordeal of three trials to clear their names. Meanwhile the trial has taken a heavy toll on both Alfie and Zak’s families, with Zak having had to watch his younger brother being dragged through the courts on the same false charge.

The trial has also exposed the same pattern of criminalisation and victimisation by the police and CPS, which we also saw played out in the cases of the Hillsborough tragedy and the miners’ strike at Orgreave.

Alfie suffered a baton blow to the head at the same protest, which required life-saving brain surgery. While the police have so far escaped any form of accountbility for their actions, Alfie was charged with violent disorder and has had to fight to clear his name before finally beginning the road to justice.

Of the 15 protesters who pleaded not guilty to charges of violent disorder relating to the 9 December 2010 demo, so far 14 have been found not guilty. In a time of unprecedented cuts to public funding, it is atrocious that the police and the CPS have wasted resources in the pursuit of criminalising protesters.

The trial has allowed us to scrutinise what happened on the day of the protest. The peaceful and kettled protesters were charged at with horses and subjected to indiscriminate baton use. When Alfie’s barrister Carol Hawley challenged officer Wood, a senior officer in charge of the ground operation on the day, on whether their batons had been used as a last resort, his reply was that the use of a machine gun against protesters would have been the last resort. It transpired that police also considered the use of rubber bullets against the student protesters.

The treatment of Alfie and other student protesters stands in stark contrast to the failure to hold any officers to account for violent police tactics or injuries sustained by protesters. In the wake of this verdict we are reminded that we must fight together to defend our right to protest and for justice for all victims of police violence.

“The struggle for justice for my son has finally begun. The whole family has been through two years of total agony. We have been silenced on what happened to our son. We can now move on to the really important thing, which is to get justice for Alfie” (Susan Matthews, Alfie’s mother).