The killing of Joy Gardner
A Workers Inquiry is needed
Statement of the International Communist Party, Political
Committee
1 July 1995
The International Communist Party calls on all workers and
youth to support the Workers Inquiry it has initiated into the
death of Jamaican mother, Joy Gardner, during an immigration raid
at her home on Wednesday, July 28, 1993.
The trial of the three police officers charged with her manslaughter,
which ended with their acquittal on Wednesday, June 14 this year,
has shown that the same capitalist state responsible for her death
will not, and cannot, establish the truth.
For justice to be done, the working class must intervene on
its own independent agenda. Workers and youth, black and white,
must take responsibility for clearing the name of Joy and her
family and exposing the facts of this case.
This is the purpose of the Workers Inquiry. It will reveal
the truth about how Joy Gardner died and who is responsible. It
will carefully gather all the evidence and take testimony from
those who knew Joy and all those who face similar attacks.
For the first time ever, working people will be able to hear
the truth about a death at the hands of the police. They will
gain an insight into the workings of the capitalist state and
its role. For the first time ever workers will be able to examine
the conditions facing immigrant workers, particularly the state
repression directed against them. They will be able to investigate
the relationship between this and the situation facing working
people as a whole. Above all, the Workers Inquiry will deal a
powerful blow against the attempts to divide workers and youth
along racial and national lines. It will strike at the heart of
the right wing course being taken by the ruling class, epitomised
in its anti-immigrant and racist legislation. This will contribute
to changing the political atmosphere and show the political strength
of the working class, when it is organised as a united and conscious
force. In this way it will provide the working class as a whole
with the means to end all forms of state repression.
What are the facts?
On Wednesday, July 28, 1993, at 7.40 am two van loads of police
arrived outside Joy's first floor flat in Crouch End, north London
to deport her and her five year old son, Graeme, to Jamaica that
day. Twenty minutes later, the 40 year old mother of two was dead.
Six officers -- two local policemen, one immigration official
and three members of Scotland Yard's secretive Alien Deportation
Group, SO 1(3) -- cut through the security chain and forced their
way into Joy's home. One officer, PC Whitby, shouted "deck
her" and, in full view of her child, Joy was forced, face
down, to the floor, breaking both a chair and her watch. She was
then turned on her back and leather restraint belts were wrapped
around her ankles, waist and thighs and her wrists handcuffed.
Finally some 13 feet -- two reels -- of adhesive tape was wound
around her mouth as a gag. Joy was left lying face down in this
position, as police officers began to bundle up some of her possessions.
She rapidly lost consciousness. Within five minutes police checked
her pulse and found none.
At 8.46 am she was admitted to Whittington Hospital, Hornsey.
Throughout the next three days Joy remained brain dead, her "life"
only maintained through a ventilator. On Sunday, August 1, when
it was clear that there was no hope of improvement, her life support
was ended. She was finally buried five months later on Friday,
December 17, 1993.
The three police officers involved in her attempted deportation
were not charged until more than one year later, on November 23,
1994. Finally, some 23 months after her life was ended, they were
cleared of all charges and returned to duty.
A woman's life has been ended in the most brutal way; a son
has lost his mother; nobody is to be held responsible.
How and why did this happen? What is its broader significance?
Only to the extent that the fundamental causes become clear, will
the means of preventing this from ever happening again also become
clear.
The trial has proved the necessity for an independent Workers
Inquiry. The acquittal of PCs Whitby and Burrell and Detective
Sergeant Evans is simply the end product of a cover-up that began
the moment Joy was admitted to hospital almost two years ago.
Throughout, all the mechanisms of the capitalist state have been
employed to exonerate those implicated and conceal the truth.
No action has been taken against either the immigration department
or the Home Office responsible for deportations. Even the three
police officers involved were initially just suspended on full
pay whilst a police inquiry was put into motion! Then the results
of this fake investigation were held up for more than seven months.
Metropolitan Police Commissioner Paul Condon stated that he had
"always known that there would be a very small number of
the most difficult deportations where the exercise of force would
be necessary" and that the three Scotland Yard detectives
would not be "sacrificed to political correctness".
The media played an essential role in the whitewash. From the
very start, they conducted a systematic character assassination
of the dead woman. Right wing Tory MP, Teresa Gorman, stated on
BBC radio that Gardner was a scrounger who had cost taxpayers
thousands of pounds. Joy was vilified as a "dangerous"
and "violent" person. This slanderous campaign was aimed
at shifting the question on to whether such force "was reasonable
in the circumstances", not whether it should ever have happened
at all. Its purpose was both to stifle any outcry and create a
political atmosphere conducive to the state, should the case be
forced to trial. Any person or organisation that even criticised
the police or immigration department was denounced as a political
provocateur, intent on causing trouble. Even before any investigation
had begun, Joy Gardner had been found guilty of causing her own
death! One of the first tasks of a Workers Inquiry must be to
expose this tissue of lies.
Who was Joy Gardner?
Joy's family have lived in Britain for more than 30 years.
Her mother, Myrna, arrived in London from Jamaica on New Years
Day, 1961. She was one of the thousands of West Indians who came
to Britain for work. They had been encouraged to enter by the
British government, which was trawling its former colonial possessions
for a plentiful supply of cheap labour. Like many other young
women in similar circumstances, Myrna had to leave Joy -- then
seven years old -- behind with her grandmother.
Joy entered Britain legally on a six month visitor's pass in
1987, to join her mother. Her son, Graeme, was bom in Britain
in 1987. She married a British subject and applied for permission
to stay. In 1990 this application was rejected and a deportation
order was served. The Home Office stated that although her
son was born in Britain, he would not be entitled to
citizenship and would be included in the deportation. Joy
sought to challenge the order. In the meantime she attended college,
studying to be a journalist. Neither Joy nor her solicitor were
informed in advance that her challenge had failed and the deportation
would be enforced.
Her terror at being confronted, without warning, by six officers
intent on immediately bundling her and her son out of the country
can only be imagined. But the use of special deportation snatch
squads is not unusual. Although it was the first time that a gag
was applied in a person's home, Home Office figures show that
this method was used in at least six previous deportation cases
in the preceding two years. The Alien Deportation Group (ADG),
just one of the squads involved in deportation, had used body-belts
and handcuffs in 27 cases during the previous 12 months. In 102
of 139 cases, handcuffs were applied.
Death during restraint is not unusual. On the same day that
officers raided Joy's home, an inquest into the death of asylum
seeker, Oliver Lumumba from Zaire was being heard. Lumumba, like
many other asylum seekers, had been held in jail awaiting expulsion.
The inquest found that he was "unlawfully killed" whilst
being forcibly restrained and stripped by seven prison officers.
No one has ever been charged for his death.
Joy's death was not an "unfortunate accident". It
was the inevitable result of the anti-immigration policy of the
British ruling class that depends upon the use of -- now legally
sanctioned -- state violence.
What are the causes?
Joy was a victim of the capitalist profit system which is creating
a social catastrophe across the globe. She left the poverty of
Jamaica to try and find a better life for herself and her son.
Millions more leave in similar circumstances and worse. Of a world
population of 5.6 billion, 1.1 billion are in absolute
poverty -- defined as living on just over 75p a day. In addition
huge numbers of people are turned into refugees through civil
war or political persecution. According to the United Nations
more than 43 million people, 10,000 every day, have been driven
from their homes and become refugees since 1992.
Faced with the colossal scale of human misery and suffering
which its system has created, the ruling class are adopting increasingly
brutal and repressive measures. Just two days before Joy died,
the Immigration and Asylum Bill, 1993, became law. This legislation
effectively ended the right to appeal against refusal of entry
into Britain. It was passed by Parliament in record time with
a margin of just 50 votes. Since then the number of refugees held
in camps or prisons has risen by 250%. Some 5,000 people were
deported in 1993 and in the 15 months following the passing of
the Asylum Act, 75% of all applications were rejected.
In every country the most vicious measures are being introduced.
The policy of the European Union was summed up by the then French
Prime Minister, Eduard Balladur, as "zero immigration".
John Major has called for Fortress Europe to have a "strong
perimeter fence". In March this year the Schengen Treaty
became effective in Europe. Whilst apparently lifting border controls
between seven of the 15 European Union countries, it creates an
inner ring of fortifications against immigrant workers. To police
this, a continent-wide electronic surveillance network has been
established which already contains data on two million people.
Britain only opposed this treaty because it is not restrictive
enough!
The ADG functioned as a secretive group, with virtually unlimited
powers. The dangers posed by the existence of such bodies and
these developments to the democratic rights of all working people
are only too obvious.
Why is the state being strengthened?
In his summing up, the trial Judge stated that the case did
not have a "political, nor even a racial" dimension.
This is a lie.
Capitalism has proved itself incapable of providing increasing
numbers of workers and youth with secure and well-paid jobs or
training. Basic services such as health and education are being
gutted. The source of these attacks lies in the economic crisis
of the profit system. Today the profits of the bankers and transitional
corporations are made only by destroying the social conditions
of the working class. Unable to provide a future for millions
of working people, the ruling class are turning to the methods
of state terror and repression to preserve their rule. Black and
immigrant workers make up the most oppressed section of the working
class. It is for this reason that state repression is directed
initially against them. But this is just the precursor of state
violence against the entire working class.
In the two years since Joy's death, laws normally associated
with military dictatorships have been passed. The Prevention of
Terrorism Act, supposedly passed to combat terrorism in Ireland,
was made permanent. In November 1994, the Criminal Justice Act
became law. This effectively criminalised all gatherings not sanctioned
by the state; made it a punishable offence to disobey the instructions
of a senior police officer and removed the right to silence. It
sanctioned the opening of "childjails" for those aged
10 and up and enabled the police to mount indiscriminate stop
and search operations modelled on the old notorious SUS laws.
This, combined with the introduction of new police batons, led
to 30 year old Brian Douglas being beaten to death by police in
South London earlier this year.
New measures being proposed against immigrants will see teachers,
doctors and civil servants turned into a "second tier"
of the Home Office Immigration Department. They will have to report
on anyone they believe is not in the country legally.
Vicious immigrations laws are only the most open expression
of the nationalist agenda of the British ruling class, denouncing
"foreigners" as enemies, rivals and a threat to "the
nation". This propaganda serves several purposes. It is used
to divide the working class and tie it to the trade and, ultimately,
military war preparations of the ruling class. By scapegoating
black and immigrant workers for the social crisis, it aims at
mobilising backward forces as "shock troops" against
all those deemed to be the "enemies of society" -- immigrants,
workers, the unemployed, the poor and capitalism's political opponents.
One month before Joy's death, Tory MP Winston Churchill made the
first of his racist tirades against immigrants "flooding
Britain's cities" and sympathising with the "native
English" as an ethnic minority in their own land". Three
months later the fascist British National Party (BNP) won their
first council seat in London's east end.
Who is responsible?
The Labour Party and the trade unions have a double responsibility
for this situation. Firstly, their refusal to defend workers hard
won gains and their servile defence of the capitalist nation state
has created the social and political climate for these attacks.
Secondly, they are at the forefront of demanding Britain be defended
against "foreign rivals", whilst spreading the poisonous
lie that workers in other countries are responsible for unemployment,
factory closures, etc. Not once have they ever defended the democratic
rights of immigrant workers. On the contrary, Labour introduced
the racist Immigration Act of 1968 and sanctioned those introduced
by the Tories.
A critical role in enabling the whitewash to proceed this far
has been played by Labour "left" MP for Tottenham, Bernie
Grant and middle class radical groups such as the Socialist Workers
Party.
Just two hours after Joy was admitted to hospital, the Metropolitan
Police were on the phone to Grant for help. They were terrified
that Joy's death would ignite an explosion of anger similar to
that which shook the north London area in 1985 when another West
Indian mother, Cynthia Jarrett, was killed during a police raid
on her home. The police hoped to use Grant's reputation for making
"radical" sounding noises to defuse this anger and give
them the time to bring the situation under control. They were
right. Whilst Grant made critical statements about Joy's death,
he was participating in meetings with Commissioner Condon for
which he earned the name "the man the Met can do business
with".
Grant has no problems combining this with his position as a
Labour MP, his image as "defender of the black community"
and his espousal of racial politics. His politics accept the permanence
of the capitalist profit system and the racial divisions it creates.
He is therefore incapable of opposing the state forces which defend
it.
Similarly the Socialist Workers Party made demagogic speeches
-- "No Justice. No Peace" -- whilst diverting workers
and youth down the bankrupt channel of protest politics. They
spread the lie that "justice" could be achieved by appeals
to the very capitalist state responsible for repression. Finally
they sought to drag outraged youth behind the TUC and its various
protest marches against the BNP, diverting attention away from
both the state's attacks on immigrant workers and the TUC's responsibility
for allowing this to take place.
All these organisations and individuals portray state violence
as a racial, not a class question. This divides the working class
and prevents it from establishing an independent class perspective
-- a socialist solution to state oppression. It disarms the entire
working class as to the real significance of the attacks on immigrant
workers. The end result of this can be seen, not only in that
there is no justice for Joy Gardner, but in the ongoing intensification
of repressive legislation and technique.
Why a Workers Inquiry?
A "public inquiry" organised by the Home Secretary
or any other representative of the capitalist state cannot win
justice for Joy Gardner. Every state-organised inquiry has not
only covered up the truth, but prepared even sharper state repression.
The Royal Commission on Justice, for example, was set into motion
in 1993 following the exposure of a whole number of frame-ups:
the Guildford Four, Birmingham Six and Broadwater Farm Three.
This supposedly "independent" investigation recommended
the removal of the right to trial by jury and the establishing
of a central DNA bank! The May Report in 1994, again supposedly
established to investigate the frame-up of the Guildford Four,
exonerated the legal system that had imprisoned them for nearly
15 years. A trial of some of the police officers involved ended
with their acquittal.
No judge, police officer or state official can establish the
truth, nor can any capitalist politician, including Labour politicians.
They are all part of the system which killed Joy Gardner and terrorises
many more immigrant workers every day. They all support immigration
laws and defend deportations. Workers must reject all illusions
that the capitalist state and its political apparatus are an instrument
for achieving justice.
Only to the extent that workers do this -- break with the old
organisations -- and rely instead on their own independent, class
strength, can a way forward be found.
The convening of a Workers Inquiry is a vital step in this
direction. We call on all those with evidence to contact the Committee
for a Workers Inquiry and prepare to testify at the inquiry itself.
We urge all those with professional knowledge of medicine, police
operations, the legal system, the circumstances facing immigrant
workers or social conditions to come forward and make statements
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