Breaking: judge rules raid of pro-Palestinian journalist Winstanley’s home was unlawful, return devices

Police case falls apart as judge refuses ‘production order’

A court has ruled that the Starmer regime’s dawn raid last October by the Metropolitan Police ‘counter-terror’ officers on the home of Electronic Intifada (EI) journalist Asa Winstanley, in which his electronic devices were seized and had been held since, was unlawful and has ordered the force to return everything it took without examining the contents.

All devices have been returned to Winstanley today after Recorder Mark Lucraft KC, the most senior judge at London’s Central Criminal Court, issued the ruling last week. Some ten police officers were involved in the raid and seized documents as well as seven devices, but the force admitted, in correspondence with Winstanley’s lawyers last November, that its warrants were improperly obtained and therefore not enforceable, prompting them to ask the judge for a ‘Production order’ to gain access to the seized items.

Lucraft said that he was “very troubled” by the way the warrants were obtained and used against a journalist, and denied the Met’s request for a Production Order that would have approved the raid retroactively and forced Winstanley to disclose information and provide passwords to his devices, saying that:

Any warrant seeking material in the hands of a journalist requires extremely careful handling.

The ruling puts a banana skin in front of the Starmer regime, which has frequently used anti-terror laws to seize journalists’ equipment and to try to force access to the devices even though it is abundantly clear that they have not committed any offences under the legislation – a ‘fishing exercise’ that also puts journalists’ confidential sources in danger.

Winstanley said today:

Instead of the unlawful warrants they used, the police could have applied for a Production Order. However, the standard required to do so means that they would have needed to show some grounds to suspect criminality and justify that before a judge. Something they were clearly unable to do.

The judge agreed with Winstanley’s lawyers that the seized devices “would include items subject to legal professional privilege by virtue of his involvement in the Undercover Policing Inquiry, or excluded material, or special procedure material by virtue of his profession as a journalist.”

Winstanley legal team was led by solicitor Tayab Ali, a partner in the noted Bindmans human rights law firm and supported by the National Union of Journalists (NUJ), and was able, soon after the raid, to block the police from searching any of the seized devices to gain access to contacts an other journalistic material.

According to Winstanley:

The only reason given by the police in their case at the Old Bailey as to why they should be granted access to the journalistic devices they illegally seized was “attribution” of my Twitter/X account. In other words, they claimed to have needed the devices to make sure it really was my Twitter account! They could have just asked me.

In a letter accompanying the unlawful warrants that the police served on me during the raid, police stated that they were investigating “possible offences” under Sections 1 and 2 of the Terrorism Act 2006. The unlawful warrants had authorised seizure of my devices plus any material that “demonstrates a mindset conducive with the support of [the] proscribed group Hamas.”

A senior officer on the morning of the raid would only tell me that it related to “social media posts” I had made. He refused to specify which ones. The police later disclosed to my lawyers two detailed reports (from October 2023 and February 2024) by their “Counter Terrorism Internet Referral Unit”, containing no less than 80 pages of screenshots of tweets alongside commentary from the police.

The police reports said their action against Winstanley resulted from a ‘complaint’ by unnamed complainants, which appears to have been what the second report described as a “UK-based counter extremism think tank” – no doubt one of several pro-Israel pressure groups that often masquerade as charities and maintain close links with UK police, intelligence services and politicians in order to promote Israel’s interests above those of the UK and its people.

Winstanley is a Palestine and Israel specialist who has reported on many of these pro-Israel organisations in the UK and, along with his EI colleagues, has steadfastly exposed and opposed Israel’s genocide and other crimes in Gaza. He has now called for the Police to pay compensation to him and his family, and to others affected by the raid and seizures. His solicitor Tayab Ali said:

This ruling is a resounding victory for press freedom and the rule of law. The police’s actions, raiding a journalist’s home under the guise of counter-terrorism, were not only unlawful, they were an egregious abuse of power aimed at intimidating a journalist whose work challenged the political status quo.

The court has now made clear that these warrants should never have been issued. The attempt to retrospectively legitimise the raid was rightly rejected. This case highlights a deeply concerning trend: counter-terrorism powers being weaponised against critics of government policy and defenders of Palestinian rights.

The Metropolitan Police must now undertake an urgent and transparent review of how they use terrorism legislation, especially against journalists. They must also scrutinise the external organisations they consult for advice, particularly those who appear to promote political agendas under the guise of “counter-extremism”.

These groups are not neutral, and their influence is clearly leading the police to make deeply flawed and dangerous decisions about who they choose to target.

Winstanley’s victory has struck a blow for justice and democracy to the Starmer regime’s ‘lawfare’ war, using anti-terror legislation, on journalists and others who oppose Israel’s slaughter and starvation of the Palestinian people in Gaza – but the war continues, with some journalists and activists facing charges and possible prison sentences of up to fourteen years under the Terrorism Act as the regime tries to silence support for Palestinians and criticism and exposure of Israel’s crimes and its interference in UK politics and legal processes.

At least three writers, at least one of them Jewish, are being prosecuted by the state under the Terrorism Act and others, like Richard Medhurst, have had devices seized and are waiting to find out whether they will be charged. Police have also used terrorism laws to hold young anti-genocide activists in prison for more than a year, despite not bringing charges against them under those laws.

Under the Starmer regime, Israeli war criminals and their terrorist allies are welcome in the UK but those who oppose war crimes face prosecution, legal costs and potential long jail sentences.

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