Red Roaster, 11 March 2014, at 8pm
'Undercover': how the police used infiltration and intimacy to gather information on non-violent activists
'Undercover': how the police used infiltration and intimacy to gather information on non-violent activists
Investigative journalist Rob Evans, working with colleague Paul Lewis, laid bare an undercover operation so secretive that some of the UK’s most senior police officers had no idea it existed. The job of the clandestine unit was to monitor British 'subversives' – including environmental activists, anti-racist groups and animal-rights campaigners.
Due to the compelling work of these dogged journalists, and the publication of their book Undercover, we now know how the police stole the identities of dead people to create fake passports, driving licences and bank accounts. They then went deep undercover for years, inventing whole new lives so that they could live incognito among the people they were spying on.
They used sex, intimate relationships and drugs to build their credibility. They betrayed friends, deceived lovers and even fathered children.
The NUJ Brighton & Sussex branch is delighted to host Rob Evans to talk about his work and the issues raised in Undercover.
Rob will also reveal how journalists reporting on politically sensitive stories and attending protests and political meetings can find themselves on the police’s ‘domestic extremist’ database – and how to use the Data Protection Act to find out if that applies to you.
Read a review from the London Review of Books here.
Book now at Eventbrite. Due to expected high demand for this event, there will be free early bird registration for NUJ members until 4 March; thereafter £2. Non-members welcome at £2.
Due to the compelling work of these dogged journalists, and the publication of their book Undercover, we now know how the police stole the identities of dead people to create fake passports, driving licences and bank accounts. They then went deep undercover for years, inventing whole new lives so that they could live incognito among the people they were spying on.
They used sex, intimate relationships and drugs to build their credibility. They betrayed friends, deceived lovers and even fathered children.
The NUJ Brighton & Sussex branch is delighted to host Rob Evans to talk about his work and the issues raised in Undercover.
Rob will also reveal how journalists reporting on politically sensitive stories and attending protests and political meetings can find themselves on the police’s ‘domestic extremist’ database – and how to use the Data Protection Act to find out if that applies to you.
Read a review from the London Review of Books here.
Book now at Eventbrite. Due to expected high demand for this event, there will be free early bird registration for NUJ members until 4 March; thereafter £2. Non-members welcome at £2.
Some more background reading: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/feb/03/undercover-officer-major-riot-john-jordan
