Church and State blog: Declan’s statement to the police

Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Declan’s statement to the police

Last night Declan and I delivered a typed statement to Bethnal Green Police Station for the attention of PC Richard Bentley (823 HT), who is investigating the assault on Declan by a homeless guy in the Whitechapel Mission last Saturday morning. Declan was given a crime reference number (4204886/07), and has now to be called to make the statement official.

Declan wrote the statement yesterday morning after the Dellow Centre let this homeless and his girlfriend do a laundry at the same time as us, which the two shouldn’t have because they have washing machines available to them in their respective local Salvation Army hostels.

This particular woman apparently set off one of the last fights that took place in the Whitechapel Mission on Sunday, 11 February after she shouted at some guy that her brother was going to slit his throat from ear to ear. (As reported in my blog, in all there were five fights that morning, the first two of which I witnessed.)

This is Declan’s statement:

Statement of Declan Heavey for PC Bentley (823 HT) re assault on 17 February 2007 in the Whitechapel Mission at 9.00am approx. Awaiting crime reference no.

I, Declan Heavey, a rough sleeper with my wife in the porch known as …, hereby declare that I was assaulted without provocation in the Whitechapel Mission, 212 Whitechapel Road on Saturday, 17 February 2007 by an individual called Ali by the mission staff, and herein referred to by that name.

At 9.00am approximately, I left the table I was sitting at (with four chairs connected to it, two either side) to get a cup of coffee for myself. My wife had already left to take a shower. At the back of my chair hung my coat and underneath I had one half of our belongings tied up.

I had no sooner left my chair when Ali moved from where he was and took my seat to talk with someone. I immediately returned to retake my seat before it might become more difficult to do so. Despite the non-confrontational manner with which I attempted to regain my seat, Ali accused me of being a “racist”. When I told him that he could have the seat and sought to untie the bags from the empty chair beside him, he stood up, pinning me between two tables and with my back to the wall.

He continued his loud and aggressive tirade about me being a racist, to which I continued to insist that he take the seat. As his tone became even more menacing, I looked over his shoulder for floor staff to come and cool him down. It was then that I received the first punch, to the right-hand side of my chin, with my hands down by my side. I had no sooner looked over his shoulder again for floor staff to intervene when I took the second punch, this time to my left cheek, my hands remaining down by my side. At this, a worker shouted, “Hey, hey!”

As soon as I could, I untied all the bags and moved them to the front of the canteen area to wait for my wife. Before she finished showering, the police arrived. PC Bentley (823 HT), having been introduced to me by the manager of the Whitechapel Mission, acknowledged from sight of my left cheek that I had been hit. I confirmed that I wished to press charges.

As I spoke with PC Bentley, his colleagues sought to arrest Ali, who had fled the building, apparently without his jacket. PC Bentley confirmed that he had been advised by the manager of the mission that Ali had been barred.

Yesterday, while I was shaving in the Whitechapel Mission washroom, a friend of Ali’s informed me that Ali wanted me to know that I would be killed by him outside the mission. I reported this to the manager of the mission as soon as I left the washroom.

Signed: ______________________ Dated: 19 February 2007

No comments:

Post a Comment

Church and State

MAYOR OF LONDON RSI PROPERTY
DAY 406 IN A WEEKLY PERIODIC TENANCY
SUBJECT TO A SECTION 21 NOTICE

(SEE PARA. 3 BELOW)

1. Our 308 Honorary Associates include 20 Nobel Prize laureates. Declan and I are engaged in a project that deals with the publication of issues significant to social policy in a number of key areas, e.g., climate change, population, futurism, atheism, and free speech. Established as Network for Church Monitoring, a non-profit company limited by guarantee, our main publication, found at the website, Church and State, calls attention to subjects, not the least which have been critical of the interaction between religious and secular institutions. We have been the target of numerous threats and actions, e.g., the former resulting in threats to Declan's life, and the latter, which have led to vandalism. The various incidents are on record with the police and other official agencies.

2. There are no less than 63 Nobel Prize laureates on the Church and State website from 20 Honorary Associates, eight articles, nine book excerpts and 33 petition signatories. (For example, one Nobel laureate signed our Nobel petition in support of human embryonic stem cell research and gave us permission to excerpt from one of his books.) Our list of associates also includes 18 US National Medal laureates, and six Turing Award laureates (the equivalent of the Nobel Prize in computer science). We have published one article and excerpted from the books of seven members of the British House of Lords. And there are 31 knighted professors on the site from 13 Honorary Associates, one book excerpt and 21 petition signatories. These figures are despite the never-ending assault on our email (this link reveals the targeting of our emails to, among others, a close colleague in Washington, DC as well as space advocates and Nobel laureates).

3. This is Day 406 for us living under the threat to life of a 'no fault' eviction by Peabody Trust.[1] We live in a Mayor of London's Rough Sleepers Initiative (RSI) property. Peabody's appalling new terms of tenancy have forced us into an unstable weekly periodic tenancy that poses a threat to Declan's life and inhibits our ability to exercise our rights. Declan accumulated quite a history with the Housing Ombudsman Service before he received the Ombudsman's decision not to investigate a referral from Lyn Brown MP on jurisdictional grounds. The Ombudsman was asked to consider whether or not our tenancy has been renewed like for like; and whether, if not, it should be in light of the landlord having accused us of not signing a like-for-like agreement. The Equality and Human Rights Commission will not accept a referral of discrimination from Ms Brown, the Commission's helpline (EASS) having grossly distorted the complaint against Peabody. We no longer have pro se access to the courts (see next paragraph).

4. This eviction matter came before District Judge Ruth Fine at the Central London County Court on 30 June 2020, when both counsel for St Mungo's (the charity in effective control of our tenancy) and Declan presented their positions. Declan lost the case and was ordered to pay £1,850 in costs. A publishing colleague in America cleared these costs within 24 hours of my blog post about this hearing for strike out on a related issue that was the essence of the claim, i.e., that St Mungo's would take a phone call to confirm that we are clients of the Mayor of London's RSI programme. Within a week of the hearing, St Mungo's had agreed to take this phone call for us both, the Court having ruled that they were not obliged to do so despite our circumstances. This time we escaped bankruptcy (counsel for St Mungo's asked for £3,407.50 in costs), but consider that to seek pro se access to justice in the courts has become far too dangerous for us. Declan currently has before the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman the decision of the Information Commissioner that allows St Mungo's to continue processing coercive support plans without our knowledge or consent and that also poses a threat to his life.

5. When it comes to traffic, we have had 10.7 million hits in the past three years on Facebook; however, I left the platform on 13 March 2021 for one year rather than risk being banned for life. It is indisputable that with any sort of level playing field Church and State would have far exceeded 2.5 million hits last year. In addition to a large variety of blocks without explanation, Facebook had so severely restricted our Page's distribution by October 2020 that it was almost as good as an unpublished page.[2] Currently, we are up to their 85th block since 1 December 2015, and as usual without an explanation. This block records as one half of their 3rd double block in the first five weeks of this year that lasted 60 days. Our traffic has also been curtailed by over 2.5K blocks on access to Church and State since 26 July 2016, including 29 full distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks since 17 May 2019 that have lasted for as long as 54 hours at a time.[3] About 70% of our hits are from Americans.

"This is precisely the hard hitting kind of response needed to clarify the unfair way Facebook is treating your highly reputable site." Don Collins, Founder, International Services Assistance Fund, Washington DC

Last updated: 26/06/21

_________________________

[1] Once a fixed term has elapsed, the landlord has the option to seek eviction even if the tenant has upheld their obligations in full (though of course the landlord must still apply for and obtain a county court order).

[2] 17/10/20: We have permission to publish this ISAF letter of 30 September to Facebook COO Sheryl Samberg. Facebook has so severely restricted our Page's distribution since 4 September that it's almost as good as an unpublished page

[3] Since October 2019, we have been defining a full DDoS attack as having such a high volume of up to 4-minute blocks on access to Church and State that we don't bother recording them all.

Church and State blog

Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Declan’s statement to the police

No comments:

About me

My Picks

Church and State

Blog Archive