#proprtionality — Public Fediverse posts

Proud Preston & The Barclays Five: Preston crown court decides terrorism still has a threshold

The five defendants convicted of criminal damage at Barclays in Burnley will be sentenced on 4 September. All five had their bail renewed until that hearing.¹

I personally attended the three hour hearing, where the court usher courteously accommodated me in the press gallery, as a legal blogger. This was not an acquittal, nor an endorsement of criminal damage. It was a ruling on a precise statutory question: whether the defendants’ conduct should be treated as having a “terrorist connection” for sentence under section 69 of the Sentencing Act 2020.

HHJ Altham held that it should not.

The damage—reported at £212,805.14—was substantial. But substantial is not automatically “serious” in the particular sense required by terrorism legislation. The judge rejected the submission that the prosecution’s application was procedurally unfair. He did not need to decide the contested question of the campaign’s intended target. Instead, he decided the threshold issue: the conduct did not amount to “serious damage to property” for the purpose of the statutory definition.

That distinction is not technical trivia. It is the difference between sentencing people for criminal damage and attaching the exceptional legal and moral weight of terrorism.

A high statutory bar

Section 69 does not create a new terrorism offence. It is a sentencing provision. Where it applies, a court must determine whether an offence has a terrorist connection and, if it does, treat that fact as aggravating seriousness.²

The relevant definition comes from section 1 of the Terrorism Act 2000. In a property-damage case, it requires serious damage to property, together with the relevant intention to influence a government or international governmental organisation, or intimidate the public, and a political, religious, racial or ideological purpose.³ Political motivation alone is not enough. Nor is a substantial repair bill.

HHJ Altham made clear that the issue was not reducible to money. Critical infrastructure—or other property of a sufficiently sensitive character—might raise a different question. He warned that: “Those who engage in direct action subsequently should not assume that the same outcome will be reached in damage of the same or lesser value.”⁴

That warning should be taken seriously. But it cuts both ways. It does not convert every unlawful act of direct action into terrorism by default. It requires the prosecution to prove the statutory test in the facts of each case.

The relevance of Head

The closest recent authority is R v Head and others, concerning an attack on an Elbit Systems factory in Filton. Mr Justice Johnson held that “serious damage” has its ordinary meaning but, within terrorism legislation, sets a “very high bar” that must “do real work”.⁵

In Head, that bar was found met in the context of a planned, sustained attack on a high-security arms factory, with losses exceeding £1 million. The court did not devise a monetary tariff for terrorism. It considered value, scale, method, target and wider factual context.⁶

That is why the Burnley ruling matters. The point is not that £212,805.14 of damage is trivial. It plainly is not. The point is that Parliament used the word “serious”, and courts must give it content. A six-figure loss, a political cause and a controversial target do not relieve the prosecution of proving every element of a terrorism-linked sentencing finding.

The defendants remain answerable for the criminal damage of which they were convicted. The state remains answerable for the legal labels it seeks to apply. Criminal damage is not automatically terrorism. Political protest is not automatically terrorism. And section 69 is not a rhetorical device for adding “terrorism” after a jury has returned an ordinary criminal-damage verdict.

That is not leniency. It is legality.

Notes

¹ Author’s contemporaneous note of proceedings at Preston Crown Court, 21 August 2026. See also The Guardian, “Palestine Action ‘Barclays five’ will not be sentenced as terrorists”, 21 August 2026.

² Sentencing Act 2020, section 69.

³ Terrorism Act 2000, section 1.

⁴ Author’s contemporaneous note of HHJ Altham’s oral ruling, Preston Crown Court, 21 August 2026.

⁵ R v Head and others, Crown Court at Woolwich, 15 June 2026, Johnson J, ruling on terrorism connection, especially paragraphs 30–36.

⁶ R v Head and others, sentencing remarks. See also The Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, The Terrorism Acts in 2024.

Disclaimer: This article is commentary and general legal information, not legal advice. It is based on publicly available material and the author’s contemporaneous observations of the hearing, and reflects the position as understood at the date of publication. It does not create a solicitor-client relationship and must not be relied upon as a substitute for advice on any person’s particular circumstances. Anyone affected by the matters discussed should obtain independent advice from a suitably qualified and regulated legal professional.

https://twitter.com/DefendOurJuries/status/2090738268975313118

Proud Preston & The Barclays Five: Preston crown court decides terrorism still has a threshold

The five defendants convicted of criminal damage at Barclays in Burnley will be sentenced on 4 September. All five had their bail renewed until that hearing.¹

I personally attended the three hour hearing, where the court usher courteously accommodated me in the press gallery, as a legal blogger. This was not an acquittal, nor an endorsement of criminal damage. It was a ruling on a precise statutory question: whether the defendants’ conduct should be treated as having a “terrorist connection” for sentence under section 69 of the Sentencing Act 2020.

HHJ Altham held that it should not.

The damage—reported at £212,805.14—was substantial. But substantial is not automatically “serious” in the particular sense required by terrorism legislation. The judge rejected the submission that the prosecution’s application was procedurally unfair. He did not need to decide the contested question of the campaign’s intended target. Instead, he decided the threshold issue: the conduct did not amount to “serious damage to property” for the purpose of the statutory definition.

That distinction is not technical trivia. It is the difference between sentencing people for criminal damage and attaching the exceptional legal and moral weight of terrorism.

A high statutory bar

Section 69 does not create a new terrorism offence. It is a sentencing provision. Where it applies, a court must determine whether an offence has a terrorist connection and, if it does, treat that fact as aggravating seriousness.²

The relevant definition comes from section 1 of the Terrorism Act 2000. In a property-damage case, it requires serious damage to property, together with the relevant intention to influence a government or international governmental organisation, or intimidate the public, and a political, religious, racial or ideological purpose.³ Political motivation alone is not enough. Nor is a substantial repair bill.

HHJ Altham made clear that the issue was not reducible to money. Critical infrastructure—or other property of a sufficiently sensitive character—might raise a different question. He warned that: “Those who engage in direct action subsequently should not assume that the same outcome will be reached in damage of the same or lesser value.”⁴

That warning should be taken seriously. But it cuts both ways. It does not convert every unlawful act of direct action into terrorism by default. It requires the prosecution to prove the statutory test in the facts of each case.

The relevance of Head

The closest recent authority is R v Head and others, concerning an attack on an Elbit Systems factory in Filton. Mr Justice Johnson held that “serious damage” has its ordinary meaning but, within terrorism legislation, sets a “very high bar” that must “do real work”.⁵

In Head, that bar was found met in the context of a planned, sustained attack on a high-security arms factory, with losses exceeding £1 million. The court did not devise a monetary tariff for terrorism. It considered value, scale, method, target and wider factual context.⁶

That is why the Burnley ruling matters. The point is not that £212,805.14 of damage is trivial. It plainly is not. The point is that Parliament used the word “serious”, and courts must give it content. A six-figure loss, a political cause and a controversial target do not relieve the prosecution of proving every element of a terrorism-linked sentencing finding.

The defendants remain answerable for the criminal damage of which they were convicted. The state remains answerable for the legal labels it seeks to apply. Criminal damage is not automatically terrorism. Political protest is not automatically terrorism. And section 69 is not a rhetorical device for adding “terrorism” after a jury has returned an ordinary criminal-damage verdict.

That is not leniency. It is legality.

Notes

¹ Author’s contemporaneous note of proceedings at Preston Crown Court, 21 August 2026. See also The Guardian, “Palestine Action ‘Barclays five’ will not be sentenced as terrorists”, 21 August 2026.

² Sentencing Act 2020, section 69.

³ Terrorism Act 2000, section 1.

⁴ Author’s contemporaneous note of HHJ Altham’s oral ruling, Preston Crown Court, 21 August 2026.

⁵ R v Head and others, Crown Court at Woolwich, 15 June 2026, Johnson J, ruling on terrorism connection, especially paragraphs 30–36.

⁶ R v Head and others, sentencing remarks. See also The Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, The Terrorism Acts in 2024.

Disclaimer: This article is commentary and general legal information, not legal advice. It is based on publicly available material and the author’s contemporaneous observations of the hearing, and reflects the position as understood at the date of publication. It does not create a solicitor-client relationship and must not be relied upon as a substitute for advice on any person’s particular circumstances. Anyone affected by the matters discussed should obtain independent advice from a suitably qualified and regulated legal professional.

https://twitter.com/DefendOurJuries/status/2090738268975313118