Be Active.. Join UFFC network
Join the United Families & Friends Social Network and get involved!
UFFC is a coalition of those affected by deaths and abuse in police, prison and psychiatric custody. Established in 1997
Join the United Families & Friends Network and help to make a noise!
4WardEver UK’s ‘Justice Campaign’ page
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A brief history of UFFC!
Until you fight, change never happens By Harmit Athwal IRR
17th May 2006
In a church in Piccadilly last week, a small group of families and friends of those who have died in police custody gathered at a press conference, supported by the Bishop of Southwark, to speak about their experiences and to launch a new leaflet for the United Families and Friends Campaign.
The United Families and Friends Campaign (UFFC), a coalition of those affected by deaths in police, prison and psychiatric custody, supports others in similar situations.
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Federal Judge disagrees with Miranda Rights violation
originally published by: Phoenix New Times
2nd February 2010
A U.S. District Court Judge has dealt Debra Milke a big legal setback, ruling that the death-row inmate did validly waive her Miranda rights against self-incrimination before she allegedly confessed to having her son murdered in 1989.
Judge Robert C. Broomfield’s 21-page ruling comes two weeks after hearing from both Milke and former Phoenix homicide Detective Armando Saldate during an evidentiary hearing in his courtroom. The hearing had been ordered by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals after it ruled that it could find no evidence that Milke had waived her rights.
Broomfield’s decision now returns to the appellate court for evaluation. The panel still may reverse him and rule that Detective Saldate illegally elicited Milke’s incriminating statements, and order a new trial. Then again, they may not. But the judge’s ruling left little to the imagination about his position.
A Maricopa County jury convicted Milke of first-degree murder and conspiring with two Phoenix men to commit first-degree murder by arranging the homicide of her four-year-old son Christopher.
Tags: Date set for Simon Hall murder case appeal
all credits: BBC News
originally published: 3rd February 2010
A date has been set to hear the appeal of a man jailed for life for the murder of a 79-year-old woman in 2001. Simon Hall, 32, from Ipswich, was jailed for life in 2003 for murdering Joan Albert, of Capel St Mary, Suffolk.
The Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) has referred the case to the Court of Appeal over concerns over the scientific evidence. A date for a directions hearing at the Appeal Court in London has been set for 10 March.
Forensic analysis
Hall’s wife Stephanie has been fighting to clear his name.
When the referral to the Court of Appeal was announced the CCRC spokesman said it was based on “fresh forensic analysis of fibre samples taken from the crime scene and other locations during the original police investigation”.
The spokesman said the CCRC “believes that new forensic evidence is capable of undermining key forensic evidence … and therefore raises the real possibility that the court would quash the murder conviction”.
“The Court of Appeal will now hear a fresh appeal against Mr Hall’s murder conviction and make a decision on whether to quash or uphold the conviction,” he said.
It is understood the CCRC spent four years considering the case and examined and rejected 23 other potential grounds of appeal.
Man paralysed after arrest demands a full public inquiry
originally published by: The Independent
31st January 2010
A man left brain damaged is demanding a public inquiry into “systemic failings” of police and private security staff which almost killed him.
Gary Reynolds, 41, an accomplished marathon runner and self-employed painter and decorator, was found in a coma in his cell a few hours after he was arrested for being drunk and disorderly in Brighton city centre in 2008.
His lawyers believe the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) failed to investigate properly the circumstances surrounding his arrest and subsequent treatment in the police station, which has resulted in a “deeply flawed report” that “fails to hold those implicated to account”.
Mr Reynolds is paralysed on his left side, cognitively impaired and will need full-time care for the rest of his life. No one from Sussex Police or Reliance Security Group, which runs the custody suite, is to lose their job.
Daniel Machover, a partner at Hickman & Rose Solicitors, said: “If he had died, there would be an inquest. If he could remember, he could give his own evidence. But because what happened to him was so serious that he came close to death and doesn’t remember anything, we believe these issues must be explored in public in order for the whole truth to come out and lessons to be learnt.”
