The families and lawyers of four Palestine Action defendants found guilty on criminal damage charges have condemned the “cruel” decision to immediately send them back to prison pending sentencing.
Last Tuesday, after more than 14 hours of deliberations, Leona Kamio, 30, Samuel Corner, 23, Fatema Rajwani, 21, and Charlotte Head, 29, were found unanimously guilty by jurors at Woolwich Crown Court in London on charges of criminal damage in connection with a raid on an Elbit Systems plant near Bristol on 6 August 2024.
Corner was acquitted of causing grievous bodily harm (GBH) with intent for striking a police officer with a sledgehammer, but found guilty by a majority of 11 to one of the lower offence of inflicting grievous bodily harm without intent.
Two other activists, Jordan Devlin, 31, and Zoe Rogers, 22, were acquitted of charges of criminal damage.
The defendants were all being retried for the offences after the jury in the initial trial cleared them of charges of aggravated burglary. In the previous trial, Rajwani, Devlin and Rogers were also found not guilty of violent disorder charges, while the jury did not return a verdict on the same charge for the other three defendants.
