Why are police refusing to answer my straightforward question over the Southport massacre?
My freedom of information request was blocked by Merseyside officers
The trial of Axel Rudakubana, the suspect in the Southport murders, is listed to commence next week at Liverpool crown court. Like every defendant, Mr Rudakubana is entitled to the presumption of innocence, and nobody should say or do anything to compromise that presumption or undermine the proceedings.
So, in what follows, I have chosen my words carefully and without making judgements on either the evidence to be laid before the court or Mr Rudakubana personally.
Instead, my focus is limited to an aspect of the police investigation that would usually be regarded as an open matter, as well as the question of what the public was (or wasn’t) told about that matter.
I raise these issues in the context of a response I have received to a freedom of information request that I submitted to Merseyside police – a response which, I believe, is highly evasive and suggests that we aren’t being provided with the full picture.
We know that immediately following the Southport massacre, Merseyside police announced that they were not treating the incident as terror related. This surprised many at the time, as the incident appeared to carry all the hallmarks of an Islamist attack.
Then, in October, three months after the incident, and after Rudakubana had been charged with murder, we learned that police had discovered ricin and an al-Qaida training manual when searching his home, and that additional charges, including one under the Terrorism Act 2000, had consequently been laid against him.
However, when announcing these additional charges, the chief constable of Merseyside police confirmed that the incident was still not being treated as terror related. ‘For a matter to be declared a terrorist incident, motivation would need to be established,’ she said.
I thought this peculiar. As someone who worked in the emergency services, I knew that there were examples of incidents being declared as terror related even though no motive had at that stage been established.
For instance, the attacks in 2019 at London Bridge by Usman Khan and Manchester Victoria station by Mahdi Mohamud, and in 2021 at Liverpool women’s hospital by Emad al-Swealmeen (an incident which, as with Southport, fell within the territory of Merseyside police), were all treated as terror related even though officers admitted that they were unsure of any motive at the time. There may be other examples.
Why, then, I wondered, were Merseyside police suggesting that the absence of a motive meant they were unable to treat the Southport incident as terror related? Had they not, even in the immediate aftermath of the discovery of the ricin and al-Qaida manual at the defendant’s property, seen fit to treat it as terror related? Did they then rescind that decision? The 12-week period between the search of the property and Merseyside police’s announcement of the discovery – a time lag which itself caused some controversy – would certainly have allowed for that sequence of events to have played out.
Were Merseyside police genuinely concerned only about motive when considering whether the incident should be declared terror related, or were other – let us say external – factors at play? Given the public suspicion and disquiet already surrounding the events in Southport, they would certainly have known that any decision to declare the incident terror related after previously insisting it was no such thing would have stoked more mistrust and alarm.
So I thought I would put the question to them. My freedom of information request was submitted in the following terms:
In respect of the murder of three young girls in Southport on 29 July 2024, I would like to know if at any point during the ensuing investigation, Merseyside police decided to treat the incident as terror related. (For the avoidance of doubt, the question still applies even if such a decision was subsequently rescinded.)
I saw no reason why Merseyside police shouldn’t provide me with the information. After all, my request centred on a straightforward question of process and, I stress again, one that would usually be regarded as an open matter following such incidents. I did not see how the release of such information would have any bearing on the administration of justice. Otherwise, why would it ever be deemed permissible to announce that an incident was or wasn’t being treated as terror related.
In December, I received a formal response from Merseyside police. They told me that they were ‘not obliged to supply the information’ I had requested. In refusing the request, they cited various exemptions listed in the Freedom of Information Act.
They argued that, if they did hold the information, it would be necessary to withhold it:
on the grounds that it would have been supplied by, or relate to, a body (such as the Security Service) dealing with security matters (section 23 of the act)
for the purposes of ‘safeguarding national security’ (section 24)
to avoid prejudicing the upcoming trial (section 30)
to avoid compromising law enforcement (section 31)
On that basis, they refused to even confirm or deny that they held the requested information.
This all seemed a bit unconvincing. If Merseyside police had at some point treated the incident as terror related, that information wouldn’t, one would have thought, have been ‘supplied’ to them. And so far as the information might ‘relate’ to a security body, or disclosure of it might undermine national security, prejudice the trial or compromise law enforcement, it would be valid to ask why these things do not appear to preclude police from announcing in other cases that they are or aren’t treating an incident as terror related (just as Merseyside police had already confirmed in the Southport case, both prior to and then after the discovery of the ricin and al-Qaida manual, that they were not treating the incident as terror related).
Merseyside police also argued, bizarrely, that, if the information was held, they would be prevented from disclosing it on the grounds that it constituted personal data (section 40). I really couldn’t make sense of this contention. It’s almost as though they were trying to find any reason at all to withhold the information.
Guidance from the information commissioner states that a public authority is under no obligation to apply an exemption listed in the Freedom of Information Act (provided that in disapplying an exemption it does not contravene other laws). So Merseyside police’s decision to apply the exemptions here tells us that they didn’t want to release the information, not that they couldn’t release it.
It’s hard to avoid concluding that Merseyside police may be attempting to conceal something. After all, if they had never treated the incident as being terror related, what possible harm could come from admitting the fact – particularly given, once again, that they had confirmed on two occasions that they were not at those specific points in time treating it as being terror related. So any confirmation that they had never treated it as such would simply show consistency.
The Southport massacre was a horrific event that attracted significant media attention across the globe. The actions of the authorities have not been without controversy, and some members of parliament have expressed concern that information which ought to have been placed in the public domain is being withheld.
Disclosure of the information I requested, if it was held, would plainly be in the public interest. On that basis, I have asked Merseyside police to review their decision to block my request. After that, and if necessary, I will raise the matter with the information commissioner.
When revealing details of the ricin and al-Qaida manual discoveries, the chief constable stated: ‘You may have seen speculation online that the police are deciding to keep things from the public. This is certainly not the case.’
I think the jury is still out on that one.
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Interesting question you pose Paul. They certainly don’t do themselves any favours by their continual obfuscation.
The magic words are always 'community cohesion,' that breaks down whenever the public are proven right however, so yes they have something to hide no doubt.