Prisons are unnatural, they are a complete violation of nature and of the human spirit. We are not meant to be kept in cages, we are meant to be free.
More importantly, prisons and the current legal system do not prevent crime. Our current legal system does nothing to tackle the roots of crime i.e. inequality emerging from the type of society that the elites have set for us, all it results in is putting more and more people into overcrowded and inhuman prisons.
Crimes do not occur because we do not have enough laws against them, crimes occur for a number of different reasons, ranking from necessity all the way to hate crimes which occur because time and time again our society sets the narritive that some people are worth more than others. As Emma Goldman once said “Every society has the criminal it deserves”.
Prisons are structures of capitalist discipline that cannot be reformed nor redeemed, alongside that, the criminal “justice” system is a threat to humanity and below we have an account of the Justice for the Craigavon 2 campaign by a member for whom this case is very close to home:
Being locked up is pure mental torture. A French philosopher once said prison is the most unnatural environment a human could be put into.
Being taken from your home, your loved ones; having your freedom robbed from you are all bad enough but imagine being put in prison, being put behind massive walls that look to be reaching the sky when you stand under them; behind razor wire sharp enough to slice through flesh like a hot knife through butter.
Being placed behind a maze of cages, gates and bars. Being placed behind a 5 inch thick steel door to lock you into the space that you’re given to live in; a space 12 foot by 6 foot, it resembles more a coffin than anything else and starts to feel more and more like one the longer you are kept in it. Your only connection to the outside world is the occasional letter, phone call and visit.
Ask yourself could you live this way for a week? a month? a year? Could you imagine having to live this way for the rest of your life?
To top it all off can you imagine being forced to live this way for something you didn’t do?
John Paul Wotton started this horrific ordeal when he was just 17 years old – a child!
Brendan McConville was taken from his family, leaving his two sons behind.
The contradictions in the prosecution’s evidence are blatant; all evidence used against the two accused is circumstantial, there is nothing concrete and there is no evidence linking the two that shows either participated in any part of the event that lead to death of constable Stephen Carrol.
Here are some of the main points of evidence the prosecution used:
• MI5 had a tracking device fitted to John Paul’s car, which allegedly put him at the scene of the shooting. After the device was took off John Pauls car by MI5 operatives the tracking device went missing but then re-emerged later and portions of the data allegedly recorded on the device were missing. These “gaps” that went missing were supposedly filled by an MI5 operative that gave evidence in court. The operative’s explanation for the data going missing was “he had left it on his desk and someone had moved and then replaced it without his knowledge”
• The prosecution used as another central piece of evidence against John Paul was a coat which was found in his car which had particles of gunpowder residue on it. The particles, however, didn’t match the rifle or ammunition recovered by the PSNI which the prosecution claimed fired the fatal shot. To add to it, the coat didn’t even belong to John Paul; his DNA, fibres or finger prints were not found on the coat.
• The prosecution’s key witness known as witness M, came forward 11 months after the shooting, and claimed that he saw Brandan McConville at the scene. Witness M has a prescribed impairment of his sight his claim that he saw Brendan at the distance he said is medically impossible. Witness M’s account describes Brendan as wearing a knee length green army coat with the German logo. The coat recovered from a vehicle with the DNA of Brendan McConville on it was a brown waist length jacket. Under cross examination Witness M stated he was only 50% sure if the person he claimed he saw in the time before the incident was one of the defendants.
• Witness M’s partner, who was with him on the night in question, is unable to confirm his version of events. Witness M’s own father gave evidence calling his son “a compulsive liar” and said that he was regarded by his family as a “Walter Mitty” type character with a fertile imagination. He denied that M had visited his home on the night of the murder as had been originally claimed. Shocking evidence also emerged of secret surveillance against this witness and against the defence’s legal team.
The Craigavon Two’s case is blatant injustice against two innocent men. Their case resembles the Guilford 4 and Birmingham 6 cases. One of the Guilford 4 Gerry Conlon before he died helped to highlight and fought for the Craigvon and if he was still alive he would still no doubt be doing the same.
Don’t let what happened to Giuseppe Conlon happen to John Paul and Brendan, don’t let them have to spend more years behind bars for many more years, don’t let them be victims of British imperial “justice”.
Derry Anarchist Black Cross 