Michael Green who terrorised Tottenham Court Road in Central London on Friday 27th April 2012 was a BNP member who previously stood for election in Stevenage. When he went to the offices of the company he asked for a black girl called Abby who you saw being interviewed on the news. Abby told him "Abby" wasn't there, saving herself from harm. Abby Baafi, 27, the head of training and operations at Advantage, a company which offers HGV courses, said the man had targeted her offices and was holding four men hostage. During the siege Green went on the rampage throwing computers out into the street. The threat provoked an armed police response with the tube station closed, a cordon around the area and bomb squad and emergency service back up.
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| Tottenham Court Road cordoned off during the incident |
Luckily the incident ended without anybody being harmed. Police have now charged Michael Green over the three-hour London siege which closed one of the country's busiest shopping streets. He is accused of storming into the office in Tottenham Court Road and allegedly making threats and carrying a weapon. He has been charged with several offences including possession of a weapon for the discharge of a noxious liquid/gas or electrical incapacitating device; false imprisonment; making a bomb hoax; causing criminal damage and recklessly endangering life.
This is the second terrorist incident by a BNP member in this area, in April 1999, the Admiral Duncan Pub in Old Compton Street, Soho, which was a busy gay pub, was the scene of a bomb blast when the Neo-Nazi David Copeland detonated a nail bomb which killed three people and wounded around 70. Copeland planted three nail-bombs, one in Brixton, one in Brick Lane and one in Soho, in which three people died and around one hundred fifty people were seriously injured. His motivation was to target ethnic communities and gay venues to stir up strife in a city which values diversity.
Once again the media were keen to state that Copeland was an isolated individual despite the clear political motivation behind the bomb placements and the fact that he was proven to have stewarded BNP meetings.
So why no mention of the "T" word in the news reports on the Tottenham Court Road incident? Does it not apply if you are a beardless, white male?
More background on the excellent Big Smoke Blog.
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