Silverstone track invasion protesters lose convictions appeals

Five Just Stop Oil activists have lost Court of Appeal challenges against their convictions over a track invasion which disrupted the 2022 British Grand Prix.

Alasdair Gibson and Louis McKechnie, both 23, David Baldwin, 49, Emily Brocklebank, 26, and 31-year-old Joshua Smith were found guilty of risking “serious harm” to drivers and race marshals during the protest action.

Jurors at Northampton Crown Court convicted the group in February last year after being shown footage of some sitting on and being dragged off the circuit at Silverstone as two Formula One cars passed close by.

At an appeal hearing in London in June, the protesters’ lawyers argued that their convictions were “unsafe”.

The Crown Prosecution Service opposed the appeals, telling judges that there were “clearly sections of the public who were at risk” during the protest and that after jumping fences, activists went into “a dangerous prohibited area”.

On Friday, Lord Justice Holroyde, who considered the cases alongside Mr Justice Griffiths and Judge Nicholas Dean, dismissed all the appeals.

They concluded that directions given to jurors by the judge overseeing the protesters’ trial at Northampton Crown Court contained “no error of law”.

In the 16-page written ruling, Lord Justice Holroyde said: “Given the strength of the prosecution case, taking into account only the risk to drivers, marshals and others who might assist the marshals, we are satisfied that the terms in which the judge directed the jury do not render the convictions unsafe.”

The activists all denied causing a public nuisance at the July 2022 race in Northamptonshire, claiming the protest had followed a “meticulous” safety plan.

Prosecutors argued protesters had clearly caused an immediate risk of serious harm to drivers and race marshals by sitting “in the face” of fast-moving vehicles.

Baldwin, Gibson and Smith were handed 12-month community orders by Mr Justice Garnham in March last year.

McKechnie and Brocklebank – who have a joint previous conviction for glueing themselves to the frame of a £70 million Van Gogh painting days before the F1 protest – were given suspended prison sentences of 12 months and six months respectively, both suspended for two years.

The protesters’ legal teams appealed against their convictions on grounds relating to Mr Justice Garnham’s rejection of their mid-trial argument that there was “no case to answer”.

At the hearing in June, it was argued that only a “handful” of individuals were potentially put at risk by their actions, which did not amount to an impact on “a section of the public” as required by the public nuisance offence.

Nadesh Karu, representing Smith and Brocklebank, said Silverstone’s Wellington Straight, where the track invasion took place, was not open to the public.

The barrister said the cases were “fundamentally different to a protest that takes place on a public highway”, adding that prosecutors accepted the 115,000 spectators were not at risk of serious harm.

Race marshals were also not at risk of harm because they were not allowed to enter the track before it was safe to do so, the court was told.

Mr Karu said the track protest took place after the majority of cars had already passed by amid a red flag signalling drivers to slow down and head to the pit lane because of an earlier racing incident.

Lord Justice Holroyde said it was “open to the jury to find that the defendants’ conduct had created a risk of serious harm to a section of the public”.

He added: “We agree with the judge’s conclusion that the arguments of the defendants were a misconceived attempt to ‘atomise’ the relevant section of the public and to reduce it to its constituent parts in order to characterise them as a series of unrelated individuals.”

Brocklebank, of Yeadon, Leeds; Gibson, from Aberdeen; McKechnie, from Manchester; and Smith, from Lees in Oldham, went on to the race circuit during the protest.

Baldwin, of Stonesfield, Oxfordshire, was found in a car park along with glue, cable ties and a Just Stop Oil banner and was said by prosecutors to have been “in it together” with his co-defendants.

His barrister Rabah Kherbane argued that he did not assist or encourage the other activists in getting onto the track.

Baldwin, who was pulled back by a race marshal, had his bid to appeal against his conviction on the grounds that there was insufficient evidence to establish secondary liability rejected by judges.

They said it appeared like a “cynical attempt … to rely on the speed of a marshal’s response – itself an indication of the high degree of risk created by persons trespassing onto the prohibited area when cars were moving round the track – to distance himself from the conduct of his co-accused who managed to clear the fences”.

At the trial, jurors were shown personal video statements from the defendants recorded a day before the protest, including a claim that the world is “being destroyed for the benefit of a few people”.

The court was told that the protest action was designed to draw media attention to Just Stop Oil’s call for the Government to halt new fossil fuel extraction licences.

Bethany Mogie, from St Albans, aged 40 when convicted alongside the other protesters, withdrew her appeal before Wednesday’s hearing.