Section:GDN BE PaGe:1 Edition Date:110114 Edition:01 Zone:S Sent at 13/1/2011 20:42 cYanmaGentaYellowblack12A

*

Continued on page 2 ≥

Convictions challenged in wake of police spy revelations

Paul Lewis Afua Hirsch Rob Evans

Twenty environmental activists are seeking to overturn recent criminal con-victions in the wake of the Guardian’s revelations about a network of under-cover police offi cers embedded deep in the movement.

Lawyers for the group claim that a failure to disclose the role of covert police operative Mark Kennedy during their trial may have led to a miscarriage of justice and have written to the Crown Prosecution Service demanding details of his role.

Six other activists walked free from court earlier this week after their lawyer,

Mike Schwarz , demanded details of the part played by Kennedy in planning the environmental protest they took part in at Ratcliff e-on-Soar power station, near Nottingham, in 2009.

However, last month, in a separate trial, the 20 green campaigners were convicted of conspiracy to commit aggra-vated trespass during the same protest, after failing to convince a jury that their

actions were designed to prevent immedi-ate harm to human life and property from climate change.

“The police allowed this trial, unlike the later one, to run all the way to conviction,” said Schwarz , whose fi rm, Bindmans, rep-resents both groups of protesters. “In the light of events last week, this must be seen as a potential miscarriage of justice.”

Revelations of PC Kennedy’s activities by the Guardian this week have triggered a crisis in undercover policing. He is alleged to have played a central role in organising a proposal to break into the power station.

Kennedy used the fake identity “Mark Stone” to live for seven years in the protest movement, infi ltrating activist groups in 22 countries . He had sexual relationships with a number of women. He also revealed

the identity of another undercover offi cer , leading to a security operation this week as police tried to ensure all their under-cover offi cers were safe.

An investigation into the collapse of the trial of the six activists is expected to be launched shortly by the Independent Police Complaints Commission. The body is also considering widening its inquiry to take into account whether or not Kennedy acted as an agent provocateur during his years undercover. A further review into the wider undercover oper-ation and those organising it may also follow.

The case of Kennedy and the other undercover offi cer – a woman the Guard-

Mark Kennedy’s conduct while spying on activists has raised serious questions about undercover police work

Hundreds killed as fl ood chaos spreads Tom Phillips TeresópolisSam Jones

Rescue workers in Brazil were yesterday battling to reach areas cut off by landslides that have killed nearly 400 people , as rain and fl oods continued to pound Australia, Sri Lanka and the Philippines.

Torrents of mud and water that were set off by heavy rains cut a destructive path through the mountainous Serrana region near Rio de Janeiro, toppling houses, buckling roads and burying families .

“It’s like an earthquake struck some areas,” said Jorge Mario, mayor of Ter-esópolis, where at least 158 people died when a mudslide tore through the town.

Fernando Rodrigues, a bar owner, added: “It was terrifying . There were cars flying everywhere. It was dark. People were screaming.”

The total number of deaths due to the weather in southern Brazil is at least 388, including 13 who died in São Paulo state earlier this week .

Floods in Australia, meanwhile, have left parts of Brisbane looking “like a war zone” , according to the Queensland pre-mier, Anna Bligh. Peak waters in the city were lower than predicted, but 12,000 homes were fl ooded in the city of 2 million, and 118,000 buildings were left without power. Bligh said restoration eff orts would cost as much as A$5bn (£3.1bn).

In eastern Sri Lanka, days of heavy rain have caused floods and mudslides aff ecting more than a million people and forcing 325,000 from their homes. So far, 23 people have died, but doctors are brac-ing themselves for outbreaks of typhoid and diarrhoea as water supplies become contaminated.

In central and southern parts of the Phil-ippines rain, fl oods and landslides have killed 42 and displaced nearly 400,000. Damage to crops and infrastructure is esti-mated at more than 1bn pesos (£14.5m).

The Australian and Philippine fl oods have been linked to the La Niña weather pattern, which causes Pacifi c sea tempera-tures to cool, bringing more rainfall in the western Pacifi c, and less in the east .

Omar Baddour, of the World Meteoro-logical Organisation, said a link between climate change and La Niña remained unclear. He said: “ As we know, extreme events – whether their cause is due to La Niña or El Niño or other factors – will be more intense in the era of climate change.”

-≥

-≥Torrents of mud and water have wreaked havoc in the mountainous Serrana region of Brazil, near Rio de Janeiro, killing nearly 400 people Photograph: Keystone/Rex

Ministers were warned about riot prisonSecurity shortcomings exposed days before inmates went on £m rampage Alan TravisHome aff airs editor

Justice ministers were warned of serious security shortcomings at Ford open prison just two weeks before balaclava-clad inmates reduced parts of the jail to ashes in a drunken New Year rampage.

A report delivered to the justice secretary, Kenneth Clarke, on 16 Decem-ber warned that a “minimal number” of junior staff were left to patrol the jail at night, even though they had only limited training.

In the early hours of New Year’s Day, 40 of the 500 prisoners at Ford, near Arundel, West Sussex, caused £3m damage after staff tried to breathalyse some of them. The level of violence was unprecedented for a minimum-security jail.

The report by the prison’s independ-ent monitoring board (IMB) showed that searches of the prison using sniff er dogs over the past three years had found an extraordinary amount of illicit goods, including mobile phones, drug paraphernalia and 51 litres of alcohol .

It added: “While there have only been minor incidents in the last year, we do not consider proper control is being exercised at night and are sceptical of the response in the past that it must be adequate as there has not been a serious incident yet.”

The IMB’s concerns about night staff -ing confi rm claims that only two prison offi cers and four support staff were actu-ally on duty at Ford on the night of the riot. Ministry of Justice fi gures published yes-terday revealed similar minimal staffi ng levels on night duty at open prisons across England and Wales and that six jails had even fewer staff than Ford.

Charles Pinney, the chairman of the Ford monitoring board, said they had complained many times about Ford’s reputation as “the cheapest prison” and the constraints that put on governors.

The IMB report, which was made pub-lic yesterday , makes clear that as an open prison drugs, alcohol, mobile phones and other illicit substances continue to fi nd

their way into Ford. But it reveals a traffi c in illicit goods on a stunning scale , includ-ing 360 mobile phones, 323 chargers, 115 sim cards, and 200 items of drug para-phernalia . The prison’s board believes that even more would have been uncovered if more use had been made of the dogs.

A Prison Service spokesperson said an internal investigation was being held into the disturbance at Ford, adding: “We will consider the recommendations in the independent monitoring board report along with the fi ndings from the investigation.”

The justice ministry said yesterday that it was closing two of its smallest jails and turning a third – a women’s prison – into an immigration detention centre.

The two jails to close are Lancaster Castle, near Preston, which houses 238 inmates , and Ashwell in Rutland, which holds only 214 prisoners after its other 400

≥Inside, page ≥ Former prisoner Erwin James investigates the truth about life in an open prison

places were destroyed in a riot in 2009. The ministry said that the cost of refur-bishing Ashwell to the standards required was not fi nancially viable.

The third prison, Morton Hall in Lin-colnshire, which currently holds 392 women prisoners, including a large con-tingent of foreign nationals, is to be oper-ated by the prison service for the United Kingdom Border Agency, as a detention centre for those facing deportation.

A Home Offi ce spokesman said that the perimeter fence at Morton Hall was being extended to take in a neighbouring unit that had been used for a “weekend prison” experiment .

The justice ministry said that lower than expected growth in prison numbers had left it with 87,936 places and 82,991 prisoners. This meant it was possible to reduce capacity in England and Wales by 850 places without jeopardising the ability to cope with rises in jail numbers.

Was this the moment Obama won back America?This section Page 29

PLUSThe rise and rise of Tinie Tempah Page 5

empah ge 5

Keanu ReevesNot so young, not so dumbFilm&Music Cover story

This section

Cover story

£. (FR ¤.)Friday ..Publishedin London andManchesterguardian.co.uk

Watch this space The Apollo auction that’s out of this world G2 page 14 ≥age 14 ≥

PTrTP

BODYTEXTThe main “body” of a news story. Often the only part written by the reporter. This text is the Guardian’s standard body text. The font is eight point Guardian Egyptian.

BYLINESometimes the writer’s job title or where they are writing from is included. Staff writers are always credited.

Captions give a brief description of a photograph or graphic. Often they include the photographer’s name.

Five different editions per night. One star means first edition.

EDITION STARS

The biggest headline on the page is called the “main splash”. This is a serious story so no jokes are made in the headline.

HEADLINE

The Guardian costs £1.00p on weekdays and £1.90 on Saturdays. The price covers 50% of the cost of the newsprint. The rest comes from adverts.

PRICE AND DATE

STANDFIRSTA standfirst is used to add detail that was not included in the headline.

This panel tells the reader about what is happening in another section of the paper. It is to tempt readers inside the newspaper.

SKYLINE

The masthead is a specially designed logo that shows the name of the newspaper.

MASTHEAD

USE OF COLOUREvery page of the Guardian is printed in colour, though pictures can still appear as black and white. There is a double page photograph in the centre of every issue. No other national newspaper uses full colour.

CAPTION

Often front page stories continue elsewhere in paper.

TURN