Wales is a Dangerous Place for Black People Its Become the New Racist Capital of the UK

Wales has become Britain's newest capital of racist injustice and is a dangerous place for black people. in 2021 there appears to be very little welcome for black people in the valleys and hate crimes are on the rise.  

As a civil rights activists, I'm issuing a warning for black people living or travelling in Wales. 

Attitudes to race, black people and the culture of racist injustice are decades behind those of multicultural communities. Such is the culture of racism that anyone living, working or travelling to Wales, should ensure they take contingency measures to protect themselves. 

Here are my top five tips for keeping safe in Wales; 

• Think about your safety when you're travelling particularly by public transport.  Be particularly careful when travelling alone. 
• Ensure you have external support you can reach in an emergency.  Research the numbers of local support organisations
• Security assess where you're going and the people you're likely to meet there.  Unprovoked racist attacks can happen suddenly and without warning. 
• Beware of the police, and ensure you're ready to film any encounter with them. 
• Be vigilant at all times and be camera ready. 

Share this information with anyone
you know living or travelling in Wales. 

Join the campaigns below and make sure you keep yourself safe.

 

Reclaim Brixton Rec Public Meeting #Brixton1981

 

20-year-old Black woman Siyanda Mngaza paid a horrifying price for holidaying whilst black in Wales.

 

Picture courtesy of  Camilla Mngaza

Imagine the scene on a beautiful bank holiday weekend in May 2019. The weather is gorgeous, and you need a much-needed break. So, it was for Siyanda Mngaza, a 20- year-old black woman from Wales and human resources officer for the South Wales Fire Brigade, who, along with her boyfriend, went on an overnight stay at a camping site in Brecon, in the middle of Wales.  The injustice you will read here is profound, In support of Siyanda over 500,000 people have signed her public petition calling for justice. 

 

The events that were to unfold would see her become victim to a brutal racist attack by two white men and a white woman and, as a consequence of defending herself, would be charged, convicted and sentenced to four and a half years in jail.  

 

Holidaying, whilst black in the UK, can be a traumatic experience. Many in our community will take for granted that they and their families will be safe in doing so. After all, this is Great Britain. 

Taking a break in the countryside or choosing to go to a holiday resort or camping site usually poses no risk to most white families.  

 

Many black people, particularly those living in isolated majority-white areas, labour under the innocent and yet dangerously naive assumption that taking a break in another majority-white area of the country will pose no significant risk to them or their families.

 

However, in post breaks in Britain, wherever there are large numbers of white people holidaying from around the country, black people can find themselves quickly confronted with people displaying the kind of racist, hostile attitudes and violence of a bygone age. 

 

Many fail to consider that for white people from largely monocultural communities with virtually no lived experience of diversity, meeting a black person can be a cultural shock. Black communities travelling outside of diverse communities have long experienced meeting the racism of the 1950s from both white people themselves, local shops and business and sometimes local police services. 

 

When you leave Brixton and head for Brecon, you need to pack more than just sun cream and a beach towel. Getting caught out in these backwater areas can come at an enormous cost to you and your family. It is a part of black life in the UK and Europe that you need to risk assess your holiday in terms of the likelihood of experiencing severe racism you may encounter, and a contingency plan is always best advised.   

 

Such was the case with Siyanda Mngaza; she arrived at the camp on Sunday, planning to stay the night and return the following day. Siyanda wasn't a big fan of camping. Invited by her boyfriend's parents, she was keen to improve her relationship with them, so she decided to make an effort.   

 

Her boyfriend's parents were already at the site with a large group of their personal friends. None were known to Siyanda, and she was the only black woman in a group of around 15 people.  

All was well, and later that night, they all gathered, drinking and singing around a campfire. An argument then ensued between her boyfriend and his parents. Heated words were exchanged, so Siyanda went to prepare the bed in their tent and eventually, her boyfriend, slightly the worse for wear, called it a night.      

 

Returning to the campfire by herself to calm the situation, Siyanda was subsequently verbally attacked and physically confronted by a drunk white woman, let's call her Karen.

 

Karen pushed and punched Siayanda and she was suddenly surrounded by Karen and two white men. 

 

Siyanda stepped back, telling all three to leave her alone. Karen, now encouraged with the support over to white male colleagues, launched another attack.  

Siyanda told me, "I was in fear of my life, my boyfriend was asleep, it was clear these people were drunk, I was in a pitch-black campsite at the dead of night, in the middle of nowhere."  

 

She added, "I'm unsteady on my feet after surgery on my leg and can easily be pushed off balance. I had no choice but to defend myself. When you're faced with three people running towards you, screaming racist abuse, then she fell upon me, punching me, As we fell to the floor, I was surrounded by the men screaming whilst kicking and stomping me all over. You can imagine my terror. I'm quite small, and at that point, I thought I was going to die.'   

 

She then proceeded to try and get some help and pleaded for some other campers to help her. They didn't want to get involved and refused to help, and as she continued to look for help, she came across another camper who immediately abused her, saying, "You just hit my friend. We don't want you around here". 

 

As she made her way along a gravel road towards a local pub, she met the Dyfed Powys Police, four officers from the local Brecon Police station making their way to the scene.   

 

Siyanda was immediately handcuffed straight away and placed in the Police car. Dazed and in shock, she remembers the police car door opened, and a white man was shouting racist abuse at her as a larger group of hostile whites gathered around the car.   

 

She began hyperventilating; the police returned and closed the car door. Eventually, she was taken to the local police station and then to the hospital. She was given bail at 9 pm the next day. Pictures taken whilst in police custody confirm that she had been the victim of an assault. The police routinely ignored that evidence.   

Although Siyanda made it clear to the police that she was the victim of a racist attack and had acted in self-defence, the police nevertheless charged her with grievous bodily harm with intent. The police took none of her attackers into custody, and none were arrested or charged.   

She told me, "The police made out at first like they were trying to help me. The police said that the others were heavily intoxicated, so they had put them to bed. I was made to feel that I was being taken to the police station for my safety. When I was presented with their statements the following day saying they were being classed as witnesses, it was only then that I realised that I was being blamed for a serious crime." 

 

She added, "They didn't even try and investigate my version of events, and the perpetrators were allowed to conspire with each other work out their excuses. They were allowed to stay at the campsite, and their statements were taken the following day, giving them plenty of opportunities to construct their version of events."  

 

An all-white jury sitting at Swansea Crown Court on 21st February 2020 found her guilty, even though she was a career professional and had never previously been in trouble in her entire life. 

 

And so, a small, 4" 10 professional black woman was convicted of assaulting two men twice her size and a drunken Karen and was sent to jail or four and a half years. An extraordinary sentence for a professional black woman who has never been in trouble in her life.  

 

At court, the police admitted they failed to investigate claims of being the subject of a racist attack, nor did they properly consider her injuries that completely undermined the perpetrator's version of events. They stated that nobody had attacked Siyanda is entirely inconsistent with the evidence as demonstrated by her injuries. 

Siyanda appealed against her conviction, but a single sitting judge dismissed the appeal. She has now lodged her case to the Court of Appeal and her new legal team, Hilary Brown of Virgo Consultancy Service Ltd.

Incidents such as these were prevalent in the era before the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry. Black people who were victims of racist assault would often call the police and then found themselves arrested and charged instead of the perpetrator. Those areas of the country where there is virtually no diversity, such as abusive practices and cultures of institutionalised racism, remain barely untouched by the progress made in Britain's major metropolitan cities.

Such is the social reality in these little white-majority towns where progressive practice and work on antiracist policing is at least 30 years behind large metropolitan cities.

 

Siyanda now awaits a date to seek permission to appeal her conviction, and we expect a date soon. 

 

In this country, there is long-held civil liberty that self-defence is no offence. The reality for black people is the culture of racism prevalent throughout the United Kingdom and in these isolated areas, which means that racist attitudes continue to prevail and conspire to deny justice to those caught out in the racist hinterlands of Brexit Britain.

 

The Free Siyanda campaign is undertaking a virtual tour of the country starting on 13th March in Wales, hosted by Stand Up to Racism Cardiff. 

 

On the 20th March in London, there will be another meeting and hosted by myself and supported by BAME Lawyers 4 Justice, followed on the 27th March by another meeting hosted by Black Lives Matter, Stoke. 

 

The campaign seeks your support for the local hosting of meetings to bring Siyanda's case too wider public attention. Please contact the campaign if you'd like to host the meeting in your area.

                                                     

                                                        #FreeSiyanda 

IOPC 'press release' is an insult to the Mohamud Hassan family.

The Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) investigation into the death of Mohamud Mohamed Hassan has made good progress and, given the significant public interest, we are now in a position to provide some further information about what we have been able to establish and independently verify so far. This information has been shared with Mr Hassan’s family and South Wales Police.

This IOPC did not share this with the Hassan family they issued a press release which was sent to the family.  Such is their contempt for the Hassan family there was no advance briefing or opportunity to challenge this information. This press release seems to suggest or imply that Mohamud had been the subject of a mysterious attack by persons unknown prior to police arriving at his property. 

IOPC Director for Wales, Catrin Evans, said: “We are aware that there is a lot of speculation about the circumstances surrounding Mr Hassan’s death and we now know that some of that is inaccurate. As a public body we have a duty, when we are able, to try to correct misinformation that may be in the public domain.”

if only that were true, instead the IOPC seem intent in pedalling misinformation in an attempt to shape public opinion. They're secrecy, media manipulation through the drip-feeding of selective information is a scandal and continues to deeply alienate the Hassan family. 

Having listened to the original emergency call from the evening of Friday 8 January we know that officers attended the flat in Newport Road in response to a caller who said that five men had entered the address and were fighting with the five occupants within the property. The officers’ body-worn video footage shows that on arrival a number of the occupants had injuries, and officers sought explanations about where the injuries came from.

There is no evidence of five men entering the Newport Road property and fighting with five residents. A similar 'emergency call' call was made on a least two further occasions the day after Mohamud's death suggesting that someone was making hoax calls. The above cites "number of occupants'" were injured, we say who was injured and what type of injuries were these? Fresh wounds or old injuries? 

From a search of the flat, reviewing footage, officer accounts, pathology information, and an audit trail of Taser use within the South Wales Police force area we requested, there is no evidence to suggest that Mr Hassan was Tasered at any stage either prior to or during his detention.

Speculation as to what happened to Mohamud could have been swiftly addressed had the IOPC released the Police body cam video immediately. We will continue to make our own enquiries. 

While not all had direct contact or involvement with Mr Hassan, we are still gathering accounts from a large number of officers and police staff who were on duty at Cardiff Bay police station over two separate shifts and those who were in supervisory positions. We are obtaining detailed accounts from the 11 officers who attended the address on 8 January, ten officers who attended the premises the following evening when Mr Hassan died, and 13 officers and detention officers who were on duty over two shifts at the custody suite. We are gathering accounts from a further 12 officers who have been identified from events linked to the Newport Road address around that time which do not include the arrest or sudden death of Mr Hassan.

Eleven officers attended the address. We assume, therefore that these were the officers involved in the arrest of Mohamud. Why hasn't the IOPC shared these critical 11 police bodycam videos with the family?

Catrin Evans said: “There is much more work to do to complete our investigation and our investigators continue to gather and review evidence to help us establish the events leading up to Mr Hassan’s death. We need to ensure we have spoken to anyone who may possibly have useful information to help us build a picture of what happened.

The IOPC is not a trusted organisation and the fact that they are refusing to let the family and their legal team, independently assess and evaluate the evidence is a damming inditement of this investigation process. The family want to do their own investigation by assessing the evidence themselves, 

“We have concentrated on the footage from police body-worn video and from CCTV at the custody suite which covers the time Mr Hassan spent there and his release from the police station. As our review of this material nears completion, we intend to move on to scrutinise street and private footage which has been secured, which we hope will assist in identifying Mr Hassan’s movements following his release from custody, and may open up further lines of enquiry.

What further lines on inquiry? The family continues to demand access to the police bodycam and CCTV footage and the fact that IOPC continues to communicate with the family through a press release and steadfastly refuses to provide access to film footage is evidence of the appalling secrecy and state control that this process inflicts on families. 

“An investigation like this does take time and we would ask people to be patient while the investigation runs its course.”   

This whole process is deeply flawed. It is not for the IOPC to decide what the Hassan family can and can't see in terms of evidence or when it's appropriate for them to see it, Family liaison through a press release is deeply insulting and the IOPC is treating the family as if they were journalists not victims of a tragedy.

Mohamud Hassan’s Inquest Announced for Thursday 4th March 2021

 

An inquest into the death of 24-year-old, Black man Mohamud Hassan of Cardiff will open on Thursday, March 4th, 2021, in Cardiff. The Hassan family will be legally represented by Michael Mansfield QC, supported by Hilary Brown of Virgo Legal Consultancy. Following the recent funeral of Mohamud that took place on February 25th, 2021, and a pathology report that does not identify a cause of death. This Inquest will offer the Hassan family the first opportunity to seek answers to critical questions regarding the death of Mohamud.

 

Concerning evidence disclosure, we will seek immediate access to the police body can and CCTV videos that have been withheld from the family by the Independent Office of Police Complaints.

 

We will also explore the rationale for the police attending Mohamud's home address on the evening of Friday, January 9th, 2021. There is intense speculation that they went to his property in response to public complaints of a ‘breach of the peace”  

 

We still do not know that precise reason why they attended or indeed what then happened when they arrived at the property. It's a scandal that even the most basic details have not been released to the family. Is it any wonder that our communities have so little faith in a system that cannot even provide the most basic of details surrounding the circumstances of the death in custody? This is precisely why the system is in need of urgent and radical reform. It has an overwhelming propensity to hide the truth, to obscure detail, and in doing so conspires to deny justice and transparency to those families who grievously mourn their loved ones and are desperate for the detail of exactly what happened. Surely any family who suffers a death in custody should have a fundamental human right to find out immediately what happened and why, and immediate access to any bodycam and CCTV footage that shows their relatives last living moments.

 

Our information is that the house was quiet that night and that Mohamud was actually sleeping when police arrived at his property. 

 

There was also baseless speculation by the Coroner's and the state pathologist, based on information presumably passed on by the police, that he had been drinking at this "party". This was brutally undermined by the pathology report that showed he had no alcohol at all in his system.

 

We will be working hard to secure the maximum transparency and visibility for this inquest process despite the constraints of the current lockdown and all reporting in more detail at the forthcoming public meeting, which will take place on March 9th, 2021.

 

Please join us as we increase the public pressure in the run-up to this Inquest.

Black professionals whose dream of acceptance are broken on the wheel of workplace racism.

The case of former Metropolitan Police, Chief Superintendant Robyn Williams, 29 years in the force, one year away from a gold star pension, with an outstanding, distinguished and unblemished record should be a salutary lesson for all aspiring black professionals. 

Robyn was a consummate professional dedicated to the police service that was way beyond and above the call of duty. She acknowledged their faults and was always prepared to front community discussions when critical incidents of death in custody and police brutality arose. She was intensely loyal to the institution.

We would have endless debates about the nature of racism in policing; she and I would rarely agree on tactics even though we shared the same goals. But the one thing I can say about this sister is she had a clear view of what progression looks like. She was committed to her cause of improving the service and being the exemplary, ethical police officer seeking to make a difference. Whilst we had our differences, I have massive respect for her professionalism, willingness to strive to make a difference, and commitment to improving matters, even though we fundamentally disagreed on many tactical issues.

Whenever issues came up of police racism and community relations, she would take the fight to her senior officers demanding that they respond positively to community concerns and insisting they deal with rogue officers within their ranks.

In many ways, she was the consummate black professional, avoiding political controversy, shying away from public criticism of the service whilst working hard within the organisation to bring about change.

Yet despite all her loyalty, in the end, she was treated just like any other black person in the organisation. Unlike many of her white colleagues who enjoy the luxury of white privilege, she was not given the benefit of the doubt.

Many black professional workers make the mistake of thinking that they are there on merit, and their colleagues see them as one of the team. Time after time, I have seen these illusions shattered because when push comes to shove, black workers are nearly always considered expendable.

I have counselled hundreds of black professionals forced to the brink of a mental breakdown because of racism in the workplace. Their tears run like rain, as a consequence of facing the stark reality that despite all of their efforts to "fit in", their loyalty to the organisation, they are rarely really accepted; instead, most at best are tolerated.

What grieves them the most, they say, is "after all I did with this organisation, they can treat me like this?" Many pride themselves on finding what they consider to be a successful coping mechanism' contrasting themselves with those who aggressively pursue change and challenge racism.

And this is my point. However hard you try to hide your black self, tone down your culture, wear the same clothes, straighten your hair, turn a blind eye to racism within the organisation, and rid yourself of your black identity, you will never be considered one them.

Coming to terms with that reality can be devastating. It is heartbreaking to see such naivety broken on the wheel of workplace racism and white privilege. Whilst people like Robyn and I may disagree tactically; we stand in solidarity at moments like this. She didn't deserve this, no one does,

Wales: Another black man dead after being restrained by Police.

Yet another black man dies in Wales after contact with Gwent Police following the recent death of Mohamud Hassan in Cardiff. I can report that Welsh civil rights lawyer Hilary Brown has taken on the case of the latest victim, 29-year-old Sudanese man Mouyied Bashir who died after being restrained by Gwent Police in South East Wales Newport, Gwent. We send our profound condolences to the Bashir family on the loss of Mouyied. 

Mo Bashir, the deceased on the right. 

Police were called to his home address by his parents after Mouyied began to act strangely. Several vehicles and large numbers of Gwent Police officers attended the property, and although not under arrest; he was placed in handcuffs and leg restraints. Whilst under restraint, he subsequently died. He had been a victim of a stabbing in previous weeks, and during his restraint he lay with police officers on top of him. 

Instead of providing the care he so desperately needed, he was forced to the ground, restrained and placed in handcuffs and leg restraints. This was no way to treat a desperately ill man who had already suffered the trauma of a severe stabbing. It appears there was no proper risk assessment, nor was any account taken of his wound when officers decided to restrain him forcibly. Where was the duty of care, or was it the fact, as seen on many other occasions, that all the officers saw was a black man and not a human being.

There has been a long history of black men suffering mental health crisis who have died after being forcibly restrained by police. Cases such as Sean Rigg died after being restrained for eight minutes by Brixton Police in 2008 and left unattended in a police van whilst his condition deteriorated. 

Olaseni (Seni) Lewis died in Bethlem Royal Hospital after the Metropolitan Police subjected him to prolonged restraint in 2010.

Then there was Kevin Clarke in 2018, who died after being restrained by Metropolitan police officers the suffering a mental health crisis. At his inquest in October 2020 jury concluded that systemwide failures contributed to his death. They further concluded that the police decision to use restraint was inappropriate because it was not based on a balanced assessment of wrists to Kevin than the risk to the public and police. 

Decade after decade, we've seen investigations followed by inquest inquiry followed by statutory review followed by Parliamentary reports. All have outlined detailed suggested reforms concerning how best the police should deal with people with mental illness, and absolutely nothing is changed. Nobody has been prosecuted, nobody has lost their job, no one has been held to account, and all the recommendations amount to nothing more than words rotting on the paper they're written on.

The case has been referred to the Independent Office of Police Conduct. This will fill no one with confidence as the investigation into Mohamud Hassan's Cardiff case so clearly illustrates. The system is broken, no one has any faith in so-called independent police investigations into controversial deaths in custody. 

All of thee separate investigatory processes are loaded against victims and their families. The case of Mouyied Bashir will be no different from the many hundreds that have gone before it, and justice remains as elusive today as it has been for the last 40 years.  

Speaking to the BBC Mouyied's brother said, 

"My brother was stabbed about three weeks ago. He was put on medication," Mr Bashir said.

 

"He's been battling mental health for a long period of time.

 

"The combination of the medication and his mental health, it got a bit stressful."

 

He said his parents decided to take him back to hospital but could not get him out of his room.

 

"They believed their best option was to call the police and help them escort him to hospital," Mr Bashir said.

 

"They rung the police with the intention to escort him to hospital with, say, two to three officers."

Protesters gathered outside Newport Central Police Station on Thursday afternoon.

 

He said police handcuffed him and "tied him up by his leg". 

 

"His stab wound is on his main artery, so while he is tied up, handcuffed, he started getting weaker," Mr Bashir said.

 

"My dad is in shock (saying), 'What are you doing?'

 

"In hospital, my brother was given CPR, oxygen. They tried everything. It was too late. We only wanted help." 

 

His brother was a "big character, the life of the party" and someone who "wouldn't harm a fly",, Mr Bashir said. 

 

Mr Bashir said: "It's disgusting. There needs to be something done. It's been happening for so long.

 

"Serve and protect; that's what they tell us. We are going to fight. We are going to get answers."

Gwent Police has referred itself to the police complaints watchdog in line with standard procedures for all the good that will do.

Our first and most urgent demand must be that the IOPC immediately release all the police bodycam videos to the family with immediate effect. No legal flimflam hiding behind rules and regulations. The credibility of the IOPC is at stake, and the Black Lives Matter movement is posing an existential challenge to the heavy oppression of a state system of police investigation that has so permanently nailed down the scales of justice on the side of the system.