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News - 4 September 2025

Judge bails Defend Our Juries spokespeople following dawn raids

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Willem Moore

@willem_moore


On Tuesday 2 September, counter-terrorism police arrested five of Defend Our Juries’ key spokespeople following Zoom calls relating to a Palestine Action protest. Now, the group has announced that ‘some of the spokespeople’ have been granted bail with immediate release.

Home secretary Yvette Cooper spearheaded the proscription of Palestine Action, claiming in August that the group’s supporters “don’t know the full nature of the group”. This statement followed the mass arrest of 500 peaceful protesters.

Dawn raids on Defend Our Juries

The Canary reported on 2 September:

Tim Crosland was arrested just hours before he was due to hold a press conference announcing that the mass action against ‘terror’ ban on Palestine Action will proceed in Parliament Square on Saturday 6 September from 1pm as 1,000 people have pledged to hold signs saying ‘I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action’.

Defend Our Juries is announcing that the mass action will go ahead on Saturday despite the targeted arrest of key spokespeople.

The arrests include young law student Paddy Friend, who was due to speak at the press conference alongside Tim Crosland:

 

On Thursday 4 September, the group issued the following statement:

In the Westminster Magistrates Court, the Judge has granted bail to some of the Defend Our Juries spokespeople, including former Government lawyer, Tim Crosland, who are being immediately released.

The other spokespeople’s cases have not been heard yet. They will be heard this afternoon – we will send out an update after that.

The Judge rejected the CPS’ request to remand them to prison, which could have seen them imprisoned for 18 months given extensive court backlogs.

After holding the Defend Our Juries spokespeople for more than 24 hours, the police had to either release the spokespeople yesterday or bring charges in order to detain them for longer. The Met also had the option to charge them while still releasing them. Instead the Met chose to keep the six of them detained and remand them to court today.

Groups like Amnesty International UK have criticised the actions of the government and anti-terror police:

Speaking on the charges against their spokespeople, Defend Our Juries said:

They have been charged with a mixture of section 12(2)2 and 12(3) of the Terrorism Act.

There are 42 charges between the 6 people. Another spokesperson in Scotland is facing one charge under the Terrorism Act.

The Conditions of bail:
•⁠ ⁠each will reside at address given by court
•⁠ ⁠a curfew 7am to 9pm tagged
•⁠ ⁠no contact named codefendants except in this court building or in solicitors office or council chambers in prearranged meetings
•⁠ ⁠no participation directly or indirectly with Palestine action
•⁠ ⁠only equipment authorised in advance by the police and to present to a police officer on request.
•⁠ ⁠Not to delete or disguise any material on the digital device

There may be more arrests to come, with the group announcing:

Over 1,000 people have signed a pledge committing to take part in the action in Parliament Square, with hundreds more signing up in response to the arrest of the Defend Our Juries spokespeople. A new briefing published by Defend Our Juries asks sign-holders not to comply with the “charade of street bail”. With the Met Police having said they faced “entirely unrealistic” challenges in policing the mass action on 9 August, the Briefing states that “it will not be practically possible for the police to arrest 1,000 non compliant people on the same day” on Saturday 6th September.

“You do not make substantial change from the inside”

Tim Crosland said the following while still in custody:

It’s empowering to see that we’re driving the state to such desperate and embarrassing measures. Treating us as terrorists for peacefully holding cardboard signs in parliament square.

All they’re doing is confirming the power that lies in our hands when we take quiet and determined action together, resisting genocide and defending our democratic freedoms by opposing this crazy ban.

Crosland is a former government lawyer, and has been arrested multiple times this year, with the Guardian reporting on 8 August:

“Over time, I came to the conclusion that no, you do not make substantial change from the inside,” Crosland recalls of his time working for government. A large part of his role had been to advise on human rights obligations, but he now believes he was naive about this and there was a substantial gap between the rhetoric of government organisations about rights, and the reality.

“The forces are too strong, too powerful, you can delude yourself that you’re making an impact and then you can look back and see that it’s just gone back to where it was.”

‘Clear tactic to derail mass action’

Speaking on the bailed activists, a spokesperson from Defend Our Juries has said:

We welcome the release of our key spokespeople and the Judge’s decision to reject the CPS’s absurd attempt to remand them in prison for what could have been many months. However, the fact that they are now facing 42 charges between 6 of them and extraordinarily draconian bail conditions for hosting public Zoom calls is nothing short of a scandal.

Imposing tagged curfews and restricting access to devices simply for providing a legal briefing to non-violent protestors on holding a seven-word cardboard sign outside Parliament is a gross abuse of power. These are the tactics deployed by dictatorships — not a democracy.

The targeted raids and arrests of who the police perceived to be organisers was a clear tactic to derail the mass action this Saturday – but it’s had the opposite effect. Since the arrests, hundreds more have stepped forward to defy the Palestine Action ban. By not heeding calls from across the political spectrum and leading legal figures, including the former Director of Public Prosecutions, to rethink the proscription of Palestine Action, Yvette Cooper is digging herself deeper into a hole.

The mass defiance of the ban cannot be stopped and is growing all the time. It will only stop when the UK Government abandons this grossly unjust proscription and ends its complicity in Israel’s horrific atrocities.

Featured image via Defend Our Juries





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