CAGE and organisations including the Justice Gap, Black Lives Matter UK and APPEAL have put their weight behind a call for authorities to re-examine their convictions and release the Birmingham 4.
They’re demanding that the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) use an exceptional circumstances provision to reopen the case immediately. The special power allows the CCRC to accept a new appeal even without the usual requirement of new evidence.
Likewise, the 41-organisation coalition also questioned the conduct of the West Midlands Police, calling for a full and independent investigation. They explained that:
The convictions rested almost entirely on evidence produced through an undercover operation where the men were set up. West Midlands Counter Terrorism Unit, working with MI5, established a fake courier company – Hero Couriers – with the aim of ensnaring the men. On Naweed Ali’s first day of work, a ‘kill kit’ was discovered in his car after he had handed his keys to the undercover officer, known only as ‘Vincent’, who had sole and unobserved access to the vehicle for over an hour.
To make matters worse, no DNA, fingerprints or prior surveillance could link any of the four men to the items the police found. Likewise, the court withheld CCTV footage of the period when Vincent was alone with Ali’s car from the jury.
The judge presiding over the trial also found the West Midlands Police officers to have behaved in contempt of court. The officers claimed before the jury that they had never been in contact with one another. However, the evidence of 1,000 deleted messages between the undercover officers belied this falsehood.