Supreme Court justices earlier this month denied Met permission to appeal its decision in March on the handling of the planned event by force. However, Scotland Yard said on Friday it was now seeking permission from the appellate court to challenge the Supreme Court ruling. The Reclaim These Streets (RTS) campaign team, which organized the March 2021 event in south London, criticized the force, writing on Twitter: “We can now announce that @metpoliceuk is spending more money than taxpayers to continue fights us in court. “Despite the strong rejection by the Supreme Court of their ‘hopeless’ application for permission to appeal, they are now trying to appeal to the Court of Appeal. “Will it never end?” Responding to the RTS tweet, Met Police said that their appeal does not focus on policing the vigil itself, but on decisions and communications with RTS before the event. The force said: “The reason we are resorting to this case is that we believe there are important starting points about the role of the police in advising organizers in the face of a proposed event and whether this should include an assessment of the significance of the cause. “We believe that clarity on these issues is of the utmost importance to both citizens and their right to free expression, as well as to the police in the way they enforce legal restrictions, while remaining neutral on the cause behind the the event itself “. RTS originally proposed a socially isolated vigil for Everard, 33, who was killed while serving as Met Officer Met Wayne Couzens near where he went missing in Clapham, south London, in March last year. The four women who founded RTS and designed the vigil brought a legal challenge to the force over the handling of the event, which was also intended to be a protest against violence against women. The RTS withdrew from the vigil after being told by the force that they would face fines of λι 10,000 each and possible prosecution if the event continued. However, a spontaneous vigil and protest took place, attended by hundreds of people led by the immediate action team Sisters Uncut. It culminated in clashes between officers and protesters and allegations of brutal policing. RTS co-founders Jessica Leigh, Anna Birley, Henna Shah and Jamie Klingler argued that the decisions taken by the force before the scheduled vigil were tantamount to a violation of their human rights to freedom of speech and assembly, and said that force does not assess the potential risk to public health. In a decision in March, their claim was upheld by Lord Justice Warby and Justice Holgate, who found that the Met’s decisions prior to the event “were not in accordance with the law”. After examining a written request – without a hearing – from the Met to challenge the decision in the appellate court, the judges denied the permission. However, the force is now asking the appellate court itself to grant permission to challenge the decision.
