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Five men who became “intoxicated” by terrorist propaganda have had their convictions quashed after the Court of Appeal ruled there was not enough evidence to prove they meant to act on the extremist material in their possession.
In R v Zafar and others the appeal court cleared the men of possessing articles for a purpose connected with the commission, preparation or instigation of an act of terrorism, contrary to s 57 of the Terrorism Act 2000.
The five (four Bradford University students and an Essex schoolboy) met through online chatrooms used by extremist recruiters. On arrest they were found in possession of extremist material including publications popular among extreme Islamist organisations, urging Muslims to fight.
At their original trial in July last year, all denied having articles for terrorism and said the material, downloaded from an assortment of internet sites, was not meant to encourage terrorism or martyrdom. They did not have extremist views, they said, but were instead researching ideology and other matters.
Allowing their appeals, Lord Phillips CJ, sitting with Mr Justice Owen and Mr Justice Bean said: “Difficult questions of interpretation have been raised in this case by the attempt by the prosecution to use s 57 for a purpose for which it was not intended.”
He said that, although the recorder in the original trial understandably sought to apply that section in accordance with the wide scope suggested by its wording, the wording must be given a more restricted meaning.
“The consequence of this is that the basis upon which the appellants were convicted is shown to have been unsound,” he added.
The terror legislation, the appeal court said, is imprecise and uncertain and led the police to define terrorist offences far too widely.
Lord Carlile, the government’s independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, believes that the law, which effectively leads to the prosecution of “thought crime” as it currently stands, may need
reviewing.
He says: “I don’t think the Crown Prosecution Service intended to bring thought crimes before the court, though the evidence turned out that way, it seems…consideration will doubtless be given to clarification, given that there is a Counter-terrorism Bill before Parliament at present.”
He adds: “The Court of Appeal has focused on the narrow interpretation of the statutory words. I do not find this surprising.” (See this issue, pp 298–99.)
