How the UK government is trying to tackle juries who may acquit pro-Palestine activists on moral grounds
A UK Court of Appeal ruling is the latest in a series of measures that lawyers warn shows authorities are trying to stop juries from acquitting on conscience.
On Tuesday, the court made the ruling in cases concerning climate and pro-Palestine protesters and campaigners.
It relates to a criminal case against five women charged with criminal damage for breaking the windows of JP Morgan Bank’s European head office at Victoria Embankment over its fossil fuel investments.
During the trial, which began in February 2024 at Inner London Crown Court, protesters held signs reminding jurors that they have an “absolute right” to acquit a defendant on conscience.
Judge Silas Reid instructed the jury to disregard the placards, saying they were “misstating the law".
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He then told them that it is a “criminal offence for a juror to do anything from which it can be concluded that a decision will be made on anything other than the evidence in the case”.
The women were handed suspended sentences, but launched an appeal on the basis that Judge Reid had wrongly directed the jury that it would be a criminal offence for them to acquit the defendants according to conscience.
They argued that in telling jurors this, he was pressuring them to return a guilty verdict. They said this made their convictions “unsafe”.
Judge 'lied to jury' about the law
Despite finding Reid’s directions “questionable”, the Court of Appeal held that they did not make the defendants’ convictions “unsafe", and upheld them.
The campaign group Defend Our Juries (DOJ) said the ruling is the latest in a slew of efforts by the government to crack down on a growing trend of juries acquitting members of social movements – including pro-Palestine and climate activists – according to conscience.
In November 2022, five Palestine Action activists were cleared of conspiracy to commit criminal damage after an alleged attack on the London offices of Israeli-owned arms company Elbit Systems in October 2020.
The defendants argued that their action had been a proportional response to a company that they believe is complicit in war crimes perpetrated by Israel against Palestinians.
In September 2024, a Crown Court jury acquitted four Palestine Action activists accused of causing over £500,000 ($672,000) worth of damage to a factory producing arms for Israel.
During the trial, the activists reminded jurors of their right to acquit on conscience.
A DOJ spokesperson said the ruling marked a “dark day of trial by jury and a dark day of democracy”.
One of the defendants, Amy Pritchard, said that “Judge Reid lied to the jury about the law”.
“Directing the jury to not engage their conscience – their moral compass – is an extreme abuse of power for someone in his position, and an attempt to manipulate democracy.”
She added that the move forms “part of a wider pattern” of “blatant law breaking, lies, silencing and psychological manipulation” which is how the “establishment has enabled, covered up and participated in genocide in Palestine”.
‘A complete mess’
Former government lawyer Tim Crosland emphasised that while the Court of Appeal’s ruling was “disappointing", it upheld the principle of jury equity, the right of a jury to acquit according to conscience.
In one passage, the ruling affirms that "perverse acquittal" – when juries acquit despite evidence of guilt – “certainly exists as a matter of law”.
“It remains an invaluable feature of our law, particularly in cases where defendants have acted for the greater good, for example by taking practical and effective measures to prevent genocide,” Crosland said.
'What's the point of the juries having a right if they don't know about it?'
– Tim Crosland, former government lawyer
The court heard evidence that the principle of jury independence has stood continuously since Bushell’s case in 1670, in which it was ruled that a jury could not be punished on the basis of the verdict it returned.
Today, a judge cannot direct a jury to convict, nor can a jury be punished for acquitting on conscience.
However, jurors are not informed about the principle by judges, while the defence counsel is barred from telling them.
“What's the point of the juries having a right if they don't know about it? How can you exercise a right if you don't know about it?” Crosland said.
The court also heard that the principle was reaffirmed in the case of Trudi Warner, a retired social worker who was referred to the attorney general by Judge Reid for contempt of court, for holding a placard urging jurors to acquit on conscience during a trial on 27 March 2023.
In April 2024, a judge threw out the case, accusing the government lawyers of “mischaracterising” the evidence against Warner. Government lawyers appealed against the ruling, but subsequently dropped the case.
“In that case, there was a general feeling that we don’t talk about it in the court room,” Crosland told Middle East Eye.
Crosland pointed out that, in the JP Morgan trial, rather than not talking about the law, Reid had actively misstated it.
“If a judge is making a jury think they can’t acquit on their conscience when in fact they can, that’s actually misleading them,” Crosland said.
The last line of defence
Jury equity is fast becoming the last line of defence for protest defendants, as the legal defences which they used to rely on for acquittal are being steadily removed.
The crackdown can be traced to 2021, when the Court of Appeal threw out terror-related charges against the Stansted 15, a group of activists who locked themselves to the wheels of a charter jet at Stansted airport in 2017.
However, the court simultaneously rejected the use of “necessity”, a key defence for activists prosecuted for direct action, which argues that the defendants acted to prevent greater harm.
Later, there was the acquittal of the Colston Four in 2022, when four protesters were cleared of criminal damage after admitting they toppled the statue of slave trader Edward Colston in Bristol.
The then attorney general, Suella Braverman, referred the case to the Court of Appeal, which found that protesters accused of "significant" criminal damage cannot rely on human rights defences.
Crosland noted the role of political interference in shaping these measures.
In August 2023, Freedom of Information disclosures revealed correspondence between the Attorney General’s Office (AGO) and the Israeli embassy, relating to the prosecution of protesters.
Months later, in March 2024, following a reference from the AGO, a Court of Appeal ruled to curtail the use of the defence of "consent" – a legal defence which Palestine Action defendants have relied on in criminal damage cases.
A jury's ability to acquit defendants has been further eroded by judges placing limits on what they can say about the motivations for their actions, or barring them from doing so completely.
Judge Reid has in multiple cases instructed jurors to hear cases on the basis of evidence and barred defendants from mentioning climate change to explain their motives.
In a case concerning members of the climate group Insulate Britain, Reid jailed two of the defendants who defied his instruction not to mention the climate crisis as their motivation for taking part in a roadblock protest.
A ‘stealth programme’
Meanwhile, lawyers warn that proposals by Justice Secretary David Lammy to slash jury trials for defendants likely to receive a sentence of three years or less could see an end to trial by jury for social movement actors.
Crosland said that this was the next logical step in the government’s crackdown, noting that the three-year sentencing cap is likely to disproportionately impact protest defendants.
“It's like a stealth programme to prevent jurors applying their conscience: the Lammy proposals almost feel like a logical consequence of it all,” he said.
'Removing the right to trial by jury, in my view, is a step closer to the authoritarianism… creeping in'
– Simon Pook, lawyer
“To the current moment, there is only one protester who has had a sentence of more than three years, which was Roger Hallam,” Crosland said, referring to the climate campaigner who was originally sentenced to five years in prison for conspiracy to cause public nuisance as part of a plan to block traffic on the M25 in November 2022 (his sentence was later reduced to four years).
Lawyer Simon Pook likened the proposed reforms to the Diplock court system, a non-jury system implemented in Northern Ireland in 1973.
“People tend to get higher sentences, because there’s no balance,” Pook told MEE.
Pook dismissed Lammy’s rationale for the proposals – that they are intended to clear a backlog of some 80,000 trials clogging the court system.
“It's an issue of underfunding, underfunding in legal aid, underfunding and under-resourcing in judges and barristers. It's nothing to do with jury trials,” he told MEE.
“This is a deliberate policy of successive governments,” he said. “Further penalising society by removing the right to trial by jury, in my view, is a step closer to the authoritarianism that we're seeing creeping in, particularly under this current government.”
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