A victory lap in a relentless battle
The Met pays a substantial payout to Patsy Stevenson and Dania Al Obeid
In March of 2023, my organisation, Reclaim These Streets, successfully sued the Metropolitan Police for violating our human right to protest the murder of Sarah Everard. At that point, the police should have accepted the blistering judgement, issued an apology and had an internal review on how badly the vigil was handled from start to finish.
Instead, they filed multiple attempts to appeal the judgement, which the judges called hopeless and then refused over twenty Freedom of Information Requests to admit how much public money was spent trying to silence four women who ironically wanted to hold a moment of silence for a woman murdered by one of their own officers. We still don’t know the amount but it was estimated at over a million pounds of public funds. After losing both appeal attempts in the High Court they then vindictively pursued prosecutions against the women arrested that night.
I tweeted a sarky comment about it being vindictive, never expecting the Met to substantiate that claim. But the Met never fails to surprise except when dealing with the lengths they will dig their heels in and refuse to accept defeat, especially to women. Or as Cressida Dick called us, “naive young women that meant well.” Well these naive young women cost her her job, and the naive young women Patsy Stevenson and Dania Al Obeid that were arrested that night have just won substantial damages in a payout from the Met. The Met’s apology still leaves a lot to be desired.
The Met will never admit the amount of money that they spent trying to silence Reclaim These Streets or prosecute the women arrested that night, even though it is public money; and it is expensive to silence angry women which we have learned from the Me Too Movement.
I am celebrating a victory lap for the women that went to the vigil that my organisation was forced to cancel. In my line of work, we don’t get many victory laps and this week has felt particularly relentless. Their tenacity in telling their stories and fighting tooth and nail to hold the Met to account is admirable and was personally painful to both of them.
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