- Winston Silcott
Winston Silcott (born
1960 ) was a British man of Afro-Caribbean descent who was wrongly convicted of murder as one of theTottenham Three , who were convicted in March 1987 of themurder ofPolice Constable Keith Blakelock on the night of6 October 1985 during theBroadwater Farm riot in northLondon . All three convictions were quashed on25 November 1991 after forensic tests suggested that confessions had been fabricated.Silcott subsequently received compensation of £17,000 for his wrongful conviction. Two of the investigating police officers were prosecuted for fabricating evidence but were acquitted in 1994. Silcott received a further £50,000 in compensation from the
Metropolitan Police in an out-of-court settlement which ended a civil prosecution against the force for malicious prosecution.He served eighteen years for another murder, that of boxer and reputed gangster Tony Smith, for which he was on bail when Blakelock was killed. Silcott claims that he killed Smith in self defence. Regardless of the truth in the Smith case, the negative media comment still regularly aimed at Silcott is almost always linked to his association (albeit through an overturned conviction) with the Blakelock murder rather than with the killing of Smith. He was released from Blantyre House Prison in October 2003. Silcott had also spent 6 months in prison for assault in a nightclub prior to his conviction for the murder of Smith.
In 2005, the police recruited Silcott to run a youth centre on the Broadwater Farm Estate, in a bid to reduce youth crime in the area.
In March 2007, he was found guilty of shoplifting. After his initial arrest he was held in police cells for two days for failing to reveal his real address.
ee also
*
Mark Braithwaite
*Engin Raghip
*Broadwater Farm Riot External links
* [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=447196&in_page_id=1770&in_page_id=1770&expand=true#StartComments Why 'racially-oppressed martyr' Winston Silcott does not deserve to be canonised] (
Daily Mail ,6 April 2007 )
* [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3208724.stm Winston Silcott: An infamous past] (BBC News ,20 October 2003 )
* [http://observer.guardian.co.uk/race/story/0,11255,1125536,00.html Interview] ("The Observer ",18 January 2004 )
* [http://www.innocent.org.uk/cases/wsilcott/ Innocent.org]
* [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/4152054.stm Silcott in bid to cut youth crime] (BBC News,16 August 2005 )
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.