M.S. Ahmed
Racist thugs who abuse and attack Muslims cannot be prosecuted, as Britain’s race laws ‘do not apply’ to Muslims, while anyone, including police dog handlers, meeting out similar treatment to a dog will be prosecuted and may be sentenced to a prison term. This is not the exaggerated statement of an aggrieved Muslim but the considered opinion recently handed down by two separate courts of law.
The bizarre nature of the two judicial decisions is accentuated by the fact that other religious groups, like Jews and Sikhs, are granted protection by British courts under the same race legislation. Only Muslims and Rastafarians are not covered by the country’s blasphemy law either.
This lack of legal protection enables racist individuals and organizations to pick on Muslims, attacking them and their faith with impunity. For example, when Merton Local Council in South London granted permission to a group of Muslims to convert a dairy into a Mosque, the fascist British National Party (BNP) decided to take the law into their own hands, sending extremist gangs to spit at and abuse worshippers gathering to pray at the new mosque, and publishing offensive literature, including posters.
The Council reported the matter to the police, who were advised by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) that, although the action complained about was ‘offensive and threatening,’ the offenders could not be prosecuted as Muslims were not covered by the Race Relations Act or the Public Order Act. Merton Council then applied for a judicial review, in late October, of the decision of the CPS not to prosecute.
Geoffrey Robertson, a senior lawyer representing the council, told the judge: ‘There has been a campaign in which offensive posters and stickers have been placed in and around the area of the mosque and in the civic centre. Muslims going to prayer at the mosque have been subjected to verbal abuse and spat upon. This means that around two million Muslims, citizens of this country, are not protected.’
Mr Justice Tucker refused the Council leave to apply for a judicial review of the decision not to prosecute. He also held that a review was not appropriate for deciding hypothetical or academic quesions such as the status of Muslims. But the Council is expected to file a fresh application before a panel of two or three high court judges.
While Mr Justice Tucker was pronouncing the issue of legal protection for Muslims against racial attacks as being only of hypothetical or academic interest, a magistrate court in Chelmsford ruled that police dog handlers mistreating dogs should be severely punished under the Protection of Animals Act. A police sergeant and constable who ordered dog handlers to kick and punch their animals so as to dominate them, were give four-month jail sentences on November 5.
Andrew White, a sergeant aged 37, who was head of training at the dog unit, was found guilty of seven charges of causing other officers to cruelly ill-treat police dogs, and instructor Kenneth Boorman, a constable aged 45, was found guilty of six similar charges.
The magistrate, Kevin Gray, told White and Boorman: ‘The method you used can only be described as brutal. I would be failing in my duty if I did not reflect the seriousness of these offences by passing custodial sentences.’
It is of course fit and proper to accord animals legal protection against cruelty. Muslims are not less kind than other religious groups to animals. But is it fit and proper that British citizens should not enjoy under the law even a fraction of the protection given to dogs?
But there is reason to believe that even if the race laws are extended to cover Muslims, they will not in practice receive similar protection because of the racist orientation of the British law enforcement and judicial establishment. Sikhs and other non-Muslim ethnic groups covered by the Race Relations Act and the race provisions of the Public Order Act do not receive the degree of protection they are legally entitled to.
For example, a high court judge on November 5ùthe same day magistrate Kevin Gray declared it was his duty to jail the police dog handlers refused to lock up two white racists who abused and attacked a black teenager in South London. Timothy Heat, 19, and Jason Huczek, 28, attacked a black teenager, Marlon Watson, aged 19, yelling, ‘You are nothing but a stinking nigger,’ as he left the Sainsbury Store in Victoria, London, where he worked. The pair then chased him back into the store and assaulted him, breaking his nose and bruising his face.
They pleaded guilty to this unprovoked and prolonged assault, and judge Peter Fingret, in his infinite wisdom, pronounced them not to be ‘deep-seated racists.’ He sentenced them to two years’ probation and 100 hours of community service, arguing that it was not in the public interest to lock them up.
In fact, he congratulated the two racist thugs on mixing well with the members of other ethnic groups. ‘It is quite clear from the references I have that there is no history of racism, but indeed you mix well with people of all ethnic origins,’ he told them.
Muslimedia: December 1-15, 1998
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