Seven of ten men convicted have taken their fight to the Court of Appeal
There are claims that “institutional racism” may have played a part in the conviction of a teenager jailed for plotting “revenge” attacks after a murder in north Manchester.
After the tragedy, prosecutors and police said members of the M40 gang stocked up on weapons including machetes and a crossbow, and carried out at least three brutal attacks to avenge the death of the man described as their “leader.” In the days following Mr Soyoye's murder, the prosecution at the trial at Preston Crown Court said that the gang set up a chat on instant messaging service Telegram where seven of the 10 defendants spoke of acquiring information on targets to attack in revenge. Adedeji aka ‘Stormzy’, Savi aka ‘RS’, Okoya aka ‘O1’ and Okunola aka ‘Y’ or ‘Y Hushpuppi’ identified the targets and sought out information about their movements.
Passing sentence, the judge each defendant had a ‘principal part’ within the criminal conspiracy ‘to kill others or cause GBH where the victims suffered very serious machete wounds.” He said "a lot of the caution" should have been shown before the "powerful stereotype" that "this young man with no previous convictions was a gang member" was put to the jury.
"We're not accusing anyone of being a racist," he said. "This type of conversation is very difficult. It gets people's backs up, we accept that." He said it was identified as being an issue in the police and that "there's no reason why it doesn't exist in the justice system. We're all people, we all bring our baggage."
Following the case Manchester Central MP Lucy Powell wrote to the then Justice Secretary Dominic Raab to raise concerns about the case. She said the application of the law around conspiracy charges was "seriously flawed". He said despite some of the defendants in the case being convicted of conspiracy to commit murder, and others of conspiracy to commit GBH, “it wasn’t oen to the jury to convict the defendants of two different conspiracies.” He added: “This is a significant and important point of law that needs dealing with by the court.”Mr Aarif Abraham, on behalf of Jitoboh, said there was “significant doubt” whether his client “fell within one conspiracy or the other, or neither.
Full list of those sentenced Harry Oni, then 19, of Mythorn Walk, Ardwick, was sentenced to 18 years with a three year extended licence for conspiracy to commit murder. And 21 months concurrent for violent disorder.
Crime Moston Harpurhey Oldham Rochdale Greater Manchester Police
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