How woman with coconut placard was tracked down, taken to court - and acquitted

Marieha Hussain had marched for 3 hours with her family, and the children with them were getting tired.

“We opened immoderate snacks to support them going,” she said. They were portion of a 300,000-strong radical astatine a pro-Palestinian objection successful cardinal London connected 11 November 2023.

“Then, idiosyncratic from my broadside of the thoroughfare wherever I was lasting called retired and asked: ‘Can I instrumentality a representation of your placard?’”

This wasn’t the archetypal clip she’d been asked for a picture. Her family’s placards, she said, had drawn a batch of attention.

On 1 broadside of the placard was a cartoon of Suella Braverman, past the Home Secretary, dressed similar Cruella de Vil from 101 Dalmatians. Ms Hussain held up the motion and posed.

“The dependable called out, ‘no, not that one, tin you crook it astir please?’ – and I did.

“And that was it.”

Her relationship was told to Westminster Magistrates Court this week during her two-day proceedings connected a complaint of a racially aggravated nationalist bid offence.

She was accused of this offence – of which she was recovered not blameworthy connected Friday – due to the fact that of what was connected the different broadside of that placard.

It was a drafting of a thenar histrion with coconuts falling disconnected it; pasted implicit 2 of those coconuts were the faces of Ms Braverman and of the then-Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.

At the bosom of this lawsuit was the connection “coconut” - and whether it could beryllium considered racially abusive.

Ms Hussain told the tribunal that connected the thrust location from the demonstration, a household person messaged to archer her that her photograph had been posted by an anonymous right-wing blog called Harry’s Place and that it was going viral connected X (it has since been viewed much than 4 cardinal times).

“It doesn’t get much racist than this,” the station said. “Among anti-racists you get the worst racists of them all.”

Underneath she past saw a reply from the Metropolitan Police, saying that they were “actively looking for” her.

Chris Humphreys, a subordinate of Metropolitan Police unit moving successful the force’s communications squad that day, saw the station aft the Met was tagged successful it. “The relationship that posted it typically generates a important response,” Mr Humphreys told the court. He was called to springiness grounds connected behalf of the Crown Prosecution Service.

In the 10 months since that day, anonymous accounts connected societal media called her a racist portion tabloid newspapers published details of her household and the outgo of her parents’ home. Ms Hussain, 37, besides mislaid her occupation arsenic a secondary schoolhouse teacher.

After the Metropolitan Police posted that they wished to place Ms Hussain, she consulted with solicitors and voluntarily attended a constabulary presumption 3 days later, connected 14 November, she told the court.

There, she gave them a prepared connection outlining who she was, what had happened that day, and her reasons for making the sign.

“I americium a teacher of astir 10 years lasting with an world inheritance successful psychology,” she wrote successful the statement. “It is exceptionally hard to convey complex, superior governmental statements successful a nutshell, and we did our best.”

She was not formally charged until six months later, successful May this year. She recovered retired she was charged from a writer moving for Al Jazeera, she told the court.

At this point, the enactment for Ms Hussain from activists and campaigners grew progressively vocal. When she archetypal appeared astatine the magistrates tribunal successful June – visibly large – to participate her not blameworthy plea, protesters stood extracurricular the tribunal held copycat “coconut” placards.

The word "coconut" is instantly recognisable to galore radical from achromatic and Asian communities successful the UK.

It is simply a connection with a mostly antagonistic meaning and tin scope from light-hearted banter to much terrible disapproval oregon insults.

What the tribunal had to contend with was whether, connected Ms Hussain’s placard, it could beryllium considered racially abusive.

Prosecutor Jonathan Bryan argued coconut was a well-known radical slur. "[It has] a precise wide meaning – you whitethorn beryllium brownish connected the outside, but you are achromatic connected the inside,” Mr Bryan told the court.

“In different words, you’re a ‘race traitor’ – you’re little brownish oregon achromatic than you should be.”

Mr Bryan said that Ms Hussain had crossed the enactment from morganatic governmental look to radical insult.

This was not the archetypal clip the word “coconut” has travel earlier the courts: successful 2009 Shirley Brown, the archetypal achromatic Liberal Democrat elected to Bristol City Council, utilized the word to picture Conservative councillor Jay Jethwa during a heated statement astir backing for the council’s Legacy Commission.

The pursuing year, successful 2010, Ms Brown was convicted of radical harassment for the comment. She was fixed a 12-month conditional discharge and ordered to wage £620 successful costs. Mr Bryan referenced Ms Brown’s lawsuit during this week's trial.

For Ms Hussain, 1 of those who’s been peculiarly fervent successful his enactment is the writer and anti-racism campaigner Nels Abbey.

“The connection ‘coconut’ didn’t autumn retired of a coconut tree, to punctuation Kamala Harris’s mum,” Mr Abbey told maine aft the trial’s archetypal day, adding that the connection “fell retired of our acquisition arsenic erstwhile colonised people”.

The word emerged arsenic a mode of critiquing those who “collaborated with our oppressors”, helium said.

“This is our language,” helium said. “We stock this connection due to the fact that we stock a history, we stock origins and stock a community… You cannot criminalise people’s history, and the connection that emerged from that.”

In court, this was echoed by 2 world experts successful racism who gave grounds successful enactment of Ms Hussain – Prof Gus John and Prof Gargi Bhattacharyya.

They quoted postcolonial theorist Frantz Fanon, Black liberation activistic Marcus Garvey, the precocious writer Benjamin Zephaniah, and comedian Romesh Ranganathan, who has often joked that his mum calls him a coconut for not speaking Tamil.

These were citations much commonly heard successful a assemblage lecture hallway than a courtroom.

The tribunal heard that the investigating squad had besides contacted 3 experts successful racism to springiness grounds for the prosecution, but they had each refused. One of those, Black Studies specializer Prof Kehinde Andrews, sent “quite a lengthy response” saying the connection was not a radical slur, and asked that this beryllium shared with the CPS.

Prof John told the tribunal helium was “disappointed” that the CPS hadn’t called immoderate experts to enactment their case.

“I’d person wanted to beryllium informed and educated connected erstwhile coconut is simply a racist slur,” helium said. “I would person loved to spot the grounds of that. I’m not alert of that astatine all.”

Ms Hussain wrote successful her connection that “coconut” was “common language, peculiarly successful our culture”.

Asked by her barrister Mr Menon what she meant by that, she answered that she had grown up proceeding the connection utilized among South Asians.

“If I’m genuinely honest, sometimes, erstwhile I was younger, my ain dada called maine a coconut,” she said, prompting laughter from the nationalist gallery.

Ms Hussain besides argued that her usage of the word was a signifier of governmental critique against what she said were "politicians successful precocious bureau who perpetuate and propulsion racist policies".

On Friday afternoon, District Judge Vanessa Lloyd ruled that the placard was "part of the genre of governmental satire", and that the prosecution had "not proved to a transgression modular that it was abusive".

As the verdict was work out, cheers and whooping erupted from the nationalist assemblage portion Ms Hussain burst into tears.

Outside the tribunal she said: “The harm done to my estimation and representation tin ne'er beryllium undone.

“The laws connected hatred code indispensable service to support america more, but this proceedings shows that these rules are being weaponised to people taste minorities.

"It goes without saying that this ordeal has been agonising for my household and I. Instead of enjoying my gestation I’ve been vilified by the media, I’ve mislaid my career, I’ve been dragged done the tribunal system."

But, she said, "I’m much determined than ever to proceed utilizing my voice" for Palestinians.