The event to launch ‘Trew’s Law: The Case for Automatic Reviews of Imprisoned Police Officers’ Files for Miscarriages of Justice’ will be held on Thursday, September 10 and the community are encouraged to sign up to attend at eventbrite.com.
Cllr Jonathan Bartley, Lambeth Council’s Cabinet Member for Safer, Thriving Neighbourhoods, will speak at the event alongside Winston Trew, Kim Johnson MP and others.
In 1972 three men were sent to jail on the evidence of a corrupt police officer, before their convictions were quashed in 2019. Winston Trew, Sterling Christie, George Griffiths and another man were accused of stealing handbags.
The group known as the Oval Four spent eight months in prison for assaulting a police officer and attempted theft. The Court of Appeal overturned the convictions due to the unreliability of a detective’s evidence, but they had to wait 47 years to be exonerated.
Cllr Bartley said: “There is something incredibly powerful about holding this event at Lambeth Town Hall because more than fifty years ago, Winston Trew and others came to this very building for a public meeting because young Black men were being harassed, arrested and wrongly convicted by police officers.
“They have received an apology but isn’t enough if we leave in place the system that allowed the injustice to continue, and that is what Trew’s Law is about.
“When the state discovers criminality serious enough that one of its police officers is sent to prison, the state — rather than the people that officer helped convict — should take responsibility for checking whether that criminality has implications for previous cases.
“This is not anti-police. It would help ensure we have the best possible policing of our streets and build public confidence, especially among our Black communities, and help keep us all safe.
“We can acknowledge the racism, we can condemn the corruption and we can apologise. But an apology isn’t enough if we leave in place the system that allowed the injustice to continue and Trew’s Law would address that.”
To read more about the case visit ccrc.gov.uk/police-misconduct-winston-trew/.
