Thread by @copscampaign

The #SpyCopsInquiry now hears from Andrew Trollope QC on behalf of Azhar Khan (Miscarriages of justice), solicitor who was targeted by #spycops & wrongly prosecuted

Trollope: In 2005 Khan set up his own solicitor practice. He mostly did legal aid defence work. He was one of a handful of BAME having their own practice. He did it in a deprived area, serving important local needs, he was working for local charities too

Trollope: Khan not only encourage BAME men like himself but consciously encouraged BAME women to get ahead in the profession. Despite this, the Met set up a sting, Operation Castration or Castrol. Khan was arrested in Dec 09 for perverting the course of justice

Trollope: It wasn't eavesdropping, but a plan for #spycops to pose as criminals & clients for Khan. There were staged arrests of the #spycops as drug dealer or money launderers. The spycops was taken to a police station & processed - booked in, searched, detained, interviewed

Trollope: The #spycops would request Khan as their lawyer, which he did. All of this was a charade, as later admitted by the officer in charge, do deceive Khan. It went on for at least 18 months

Trollope: 4 #spycops were involved, with complicity of those who made the arrests, & custody officers, & senior officers who reviewed the operation. They offered Khan money laundering opportunities, which he refused.

Trollope: Big bags of tablets (pretending to be drugs) were provided to #spycops who offered them to Khan. The 'suspects' were released on bail. Covert recordings were made between them & Khan.

Trollope: Police now admit this was designed to deceive Khan. One of the #spycops, posing as someone from organised crime, kept ringing Khan & seeking meetings, repeatedly trying to lure him into crime, & offering a 50k bribe. This was all done on no evidence of Khan's corruption

Trollope: Despite no evidence, they spent time & effort using #spycops to suggest crime to Khan to see how reacted. Police say they looked for any professional misconduct to report to those who grant the legal aid that his firm relied on. They wanted to put him out of business

Trollope: Was this the full extent of it? Or was there more surveillance that we haven't been told about? Khan has evidence that he & @ least 1 employee had other targeting inc phone taps.

Trollope: The #spycops were persistently trying to trap Khan into committing crime for a very long period of time, in the face of Khan's completely impeccable integrity. There were no real grounds, nothing even alleged, that could justify it. It was plainly illegal.

Trollope: It was unethical, invading Khan's rights as a citizen & a legal professional. As an Asian lawyer, it seems he was singled out in a way that would have been done if he were white.

Trollope: All the #spycops used were BAME. did they think Khan would be more liable to commit crime with them? The very basis of the operation was racist.

Trollope: This was unarguably intrusive surveillance, which should have been authorised under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act. Which RIPA purposes were met by this spying? How long was it granted for? Was it renewed? When? Why? By whom?

Trollope: #spycops went even further than their authorised actions to try to entrap Khan. The officers handling the spying lied to the officer in charge when she said she wanted to cancel the operation as, by Sept 2009, there was no evidence of wrongdoing at all.

Trollope: She wanted an exit strategy to prevent Khan realising he was spied on. But her juniors said Khan had insisted on a meeting about committing crime - a total lie - which led to a renewal of the authorisation. A 4th spyco was told to offer money laundering to Khan

Trollope: At no stage did Khan agree to any of the various crimes they offered. Nonetheless, police raided his home & office, charging him with conspiracy to pervert the course of justice. The case was thrown out with no case to answer, & abuse of process.

Trollope: The judge's ruling shows how much the Met were committed to ensnaring Khan; by 4 sept they'd tested his integrity repeatedly with no result, officer Raj was active beyond his remit to try to lure Khan, who repeatedly said 'I don't want to get involved'

Trollope: This was #spycops acting as agents provocateur, for a long period, against someone against whom there was no evidence of corruption. Khan was a victim of a miscarriage of justice. The Inquiry must find the full extent & justifications of this operation

Trollope: Police have told us #spycops are essential in the fight against crime, but here we see them in the fight against someone who was not a criminal. Why was he targeted? Was his ethnicity a factor?

Trollope: Did the officers targeting Khan work with the established #spycops units? Which other operations were looked at as a model for this? How much of this goes on elsewhere?

Trollope: How much public money and other resources ere expended? How can it be right for the police to try to undermine a commercial legal service? What consideration was given to the ethics of this, & the impacts on Khan, his firm & clients? And for his family & his career?

Trollope: Khan was not only prosecuted for a crime he didn't commit, but a crime that didn't even exist until police pretended it did.

With that, Trollope concludes.