Met Police Agent Provocateurs

[Jan Klimkowski]

The tiny, visible, acknowledged, tip of a huge iceberg.

There are photos at the url:

Spying: undercover operatives' tales revealed
Four people in the frame for spying on activist groups and one who resisted recruitment

guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 11 January 2011 22.12 GMT Article history

Officer A, 1993-1997
For four years, Officer A lived a secret life among anti-racist activists as they fought brutal battles with the police and the BNP. Officer A worked among anti-racist groups in the UK, claiming to have taken part in violence against members of the public and police officers. During his time undercover he said he had sexual relationships with at least two of his female targets as a way of obtaining information. "My role was to provide intelligence about protests and demonstrations, particularly those that had the potential to become violent," he told the Observer last year. His deployment, which lasted four years, ended amid fears that his role within groups protesting about deaths in police custody and bungled investigations into racist murders would be revealed during the public inquiry by Sir William Macpherson into the death of south London teenager Stephen Lawrence.

Martin Hogbin, 1997-2000
Martin Hogbin was national co-ordinator for the Campaign Against Arms Trade. Photograph: Mark Thomas for the Guardian Hogbin was national co-ordinator for the Campaign Against Arms Trade. He joined CAAT as a volunteer in 1997 and in 2000 joined the staff as national campaign and events co-ordinator. He was later accused of supplying information to a company linked to BAE's security department, but denied the allegation. Asked about his past by the Guardian in 2009, Hogbin said: "I couldn't possibly comment." He added that he had attended demonstrations because he thought the arms trade was "wrong".

Chris Penhaligon

Penhaligon (not pictured, not his real name) worked at Greenpeace from 2003-2008, reporting to Special Branch. In his book, One Blood, he reveals how he infiltrated the campaign group and took a leading role in its action unit for almost five years. The ex-paratrooper and police protection officer says he joined Greenpeace's surveillance operations, spending days in hiding outside power stations. He also said he drove a lorry which dumped coal outside Defra in central London. He also took part in his last assignment, attending an international meeting of Greenpeace activists in Turkey, returning with almost 500 photographs of key figures.

Toby Kendall (Ken Tobias), 2008
Toby Kendall was exposed as a corporate spy who volunteered for the environmental group Plane Stupid. The former Oxford student used the name Ken Tobias when he volunteered to help environmental group Plane Stupid. But in April 2008 he was exposed as a corporate spy who worked as "an analyst" for C2-i International, the UK's premier "special risk management" and investigation company. He was also accused of acting as an agent provocateur and of planting stories to discredit activists. Suspicions were aroused because he always turned up first to meetings, always pushed for direct action and was too well dressed. Activists discovered his real name and found a Bebo page with a photo revealing Kendall was 24 and the revelation that he liked war and revenge movies. There was also a link to a corporate networking site, where "Ken" claimed to be an analyst at C2i International, working in "security and investigations". C2i said Kendall worked on his own and infiltration of Plane Stupid was not sanctioned.

Matilda Gifford, 2009
Matilda Gifford, an activist with environmental protest group Plane Stupid. Photograph: Andrew Milligan/PA Environmental campaigner Matilda Gifford, 24, secretly recorded a three-hour meeting with detectives in which they tried to recruit her as a paid spy. During two meetings, the officers indicated that she could receive tens of thousands of pounds for information about Plane Stupid. They also told her that police had infiltrated a number of environmental groups and were running hundreds of informants.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/20...r-officers