Existential
Christian Rowe, a defendant, said: “I’m amazed we were found not guilty. Not because we are guilty but because the judge didn’t let us explain ourselves. We could not mention our motivation.
“It must have required tremendous insight and trust for the jury to see through the obtuse impositions of the law, through our constrained defence to the truth of the imminent danger the climate crisis places us all in. I am extremely grateful to each of them for that.”
At the start of the 2023 trial of the six XR activists who sprayed fake blood from a fire engine over the Treasury, presiding Judge Cole initially instructed the jury that the verdict should not be based “on climate, or solutions, or what the government is doing”. The jury were, he said, “not here to consider the quality of government policies.”
However, it became clear that during the course of the trial, Judge Cole himself had gone on a journey alongside the jury.
Following the closing arguments of the defendants, he said in his summing up: “Sometimes doing jury service brings you head on with important issues of the day…. You citizens are perfectly equipped to judge…. The rule of law is important, so is the climate crisis and every other existential threat that we face.”
Wisdom
Last November, nine women from XR, who caused more than half a million pounds of criminal damage at HSBC HQ in Canary Wharf in 2021, were acquitted: a unanimous verdict after only two hours deliberation.
Although the legal defences of ‘necessity’, ‘protection of property’ and ‘belief in consent’ (that the inhabitants of the bank would have approved of the action if they had known of the true risk) were all initially allowed by Judge Bartle, after the defence case had concluded and the women had given their evidence, the judge ruled out all but ‘belief in consent’.
Despite being hamstrung, the defendants managed on this occasion to make their case on the basis of the science and the threat.
Clare Farrell, a defendant and XR co-founder, said in her closing speech to the jury: “The prosecutor explained yesterday how important it is that you bring your wisdom and experience into the courtroom.
“And then she told you to put aside your personal thoughts. She told you to disengage emotionally. Maybe that’s what the board of HSBC tells their staff to do too?”
Decommissioned
Susan Reid, also a defendant, said after the not guilty verdict: “I have spent my life caring for the people around me and I refused to stand by while HSBC poured money into the very thing we know is causing unimaginable harm – the jury’s verdict today shows that ordinary people will not give their consent to the destructive violence of investing in fossil fuels in 2023.”
There has also been a spate of acquittals for Just Stop Oil activists. On Thursday 8 May 2025, Fiona Atkinson and Catherine Rennie-Nash were found not guilty of willful obstruction of the highway.
And on Wednesday, 14 May, activist Lora Johnson was acquitted of criminal damage by a jury in front of Judge Grieve at Southwark Crown Court having sprayed the iconic New Scotland Yard sign with orange paint as part of an Just Stop Oil action.
Johnson said after the 2022 protest: “As a citizen, a mother, a daughter I have every right under British law to protect myself and those I love. This is the moment, we are the last people that can solve this. Will you step up and join us? Together we can do this. We can Just Stop Oil.”
In June last year, a jury at Guildford Crown Court delivered a unanimous verdict, finding Just Stop Oil activists Nathan McGovern, Rosa Sharkey, and Louis Hawkins not guilty of causing criminal damage exceeding £5,000. The trio had blocked the entrances to Clacket Lane services on the M25 and decommissioned the petrol pumps.
Forbidden
In the face of such defiance by juries, the government’s counteroffensive has been increasingly draconian and in direct contradiction of basic tenets of British law.
Following the 2021 acquittal of the Canary Wharf defendants, the attorney general expressed his frustration to the Court of Appeal. In March 2024, the court ruled that the defence of consent should no longer be available to climate activists.
Consequently, five women associated with XR were convicted that same month of criminal damage at Inner London Crown Court after a jury found them guilty of breaking the glass façade of JP Morgan’s European headquarters, causing an estimated £306,000 worth of damage.
Their stated aim was to draw public attention to the bank’s continued financing of fossil fuel projects but the jury was kept in the dark. The defence of consent was forbidden and defendants were, in effect, prohibited from “telling the whole truth” – explaining their motives and context for their actions.
The group, who became known as the JP Morgan Five, was sentenced on Thursday, 12 June 2024 by Judge Silas Reid. One defendant, Amy Pritchard, received a 10-month prison sentence.
Propriety
As it happened, in this case, the defence of consent would not have been effective, as astonishingly, it is clear that JP Morgan was fully aware of the risks when funding fossil fuel ventures to the tune of $434 billion.
In the company’s own 2020 report, Risky business: the climate and the macroeconomy, it warned that the “Business as Usual” route “opens the earth to a greater likelihood of a catastrophic outcome….
“It also increases the likelihood that the costs of dealing with climate change will go up as action is delayed. And finally, it increases the likelihood that the changes in the climate will be irreversible.”
The trial attracted widespread criticism because of the judge’s astonishing legal directions. This time, contrary to the principle of ‘jury equity’ – that juries have the right to return a verdict based on their conscience, rather than just strict judicial direction – jurors were explicitly warned that they would be in contempt of court – punishable by a maximum of two years in prison – if they returned a verdict based on conscience rather than evidence.
Today, however, the balance of power between jurists and juries in cases arising from protest actions appears to be shifting back back towards some semblance of propriety.
Intervene
This has been signalled by the outcome of the trial this month of the JP Morgan Six – six healthcare professionals, all members of Health for XR, who, like the JP Morgan five before them, had also broken glass at JP Morgan’s headquarters.
Dr Juliette Brown, GPs David McKelvey and Patrick Hart, consultant in obstetrics Alice Clack, dementia specialist nurse Maggie Fay and child and adolescent mental health specialist Ali Rowe were unanimously acquitted after just four hours of jury deliberation.
During the trial, the defendants were clear that their actions were motivated by a duty of care to all, including those working inside the JPMorgan building. This time, they argued their case on medical grounds, of primum non nocere – “do no harm” – a foundational principle of medical ethics requiring practitioners to ensure no unnecessary harm or suffering to patients and one that even the most contrarian of jurors would have found difficult to fault.
Dr Brown said: “Medicine says we are duty bound to intervene when we see a looming threat, to take the most effective action to save a life, even if it involves breaking the rules.” In effect, that responsibility does not end at the clinic door when preventable harm is escalating.
Justice
Following the acquittal, an XR spokesperson stated: “Today’s verdict sends a clear message: when institutions of power fail to protect life, conscience, care, and collective responsibility still matter — and juries understand that.”
But complacency would be dangerous. Such defeats are why the government now threatens to reintroduce what in effect would be a revival of the discredited juryless Diplock trials of Northern Ireland, which were abolished in 2007.
However, with juries increasingly finding their voices, we may be approaching the point where the government and the Crown Prosecution Service may conclude that prosecuting conscientious protectors, or indeed supporters of Palestine Action, with or without a jury, is neither ethical nor practical.
Can we hope that we are seeing a paradigm shift that signals the end of an era of authoritarian control of the judiciary: one where the ‘will of the people’ is re-entrenched as at the core of the justice system?
This Author
Tom Hardy has over 40 years’ experience in education as an editor, writer, and consultant. He has written for the Times Educational Supplement and the International Journal of Art and Design Education and advised the Department for Education. He now works with Media Revolution.