Two witnesses to the desecration of an exhibition in Brixton’s Windrush Square today (6 July) today told a group including Home Office minister Seema Malhotra that they saw police officers help the perpetrator to try to clean up the damage.
Shanae and Deborah said they were in the square when, late on Wednesday night (2 July), they saw the officers collect water from Brixton McDonald’s and use it to clean some of the 20 images of members of the Windrush Generation that had been sprayed with paint and attacked with a sharp object.
All of the 20 images were gouged around the eyes, leaving irreparable damage.
In response to an enquiry from the Blog about the report of the olive actions, the Metropolitan police announced that they had arrested a 24-year-old man in connection with the damage.
The police said that, “based on enquiries carried out so far, the incident is not being treated as a hate crime. Further enquiries will take place to establish the circumstances.”
Superintendent Gabriel Cameron who leads policing in Brixton said: “We understand that those in the community will feel distressed about vandalism to the Windrush exhibition in Brixton.
“We believe that this was not a hate crime, and I want to reassure anyone with concerns, that a man has now been arrested.
æLocal neighbourhood officers have been in contact with the organiser of the exhibition, and remain in the area to respond to any questions or worries that people may have.”
Seema Malhotra, a parliamentary under-secretary of state in the Home Office, whose responsibilities include immigration policy and the Windrush compensation scheme, had come to see and hear for herself the damage to the Windrush Untold Stories exhibition and the effect it has had locally and nationally.
Ros Griffiths and Lee Lawrence, both of whose images in the exhibition were attacked, were in the group that heard from Shanae and Deborah.
Griffiths and Lawrence had told the minister that they were concerned that CCTV surveillance recordings of the incident – that would have been recorded by both police and Lambeth council cameras – had neither been made public, nor shown to people directly affected, like them.
Ros Griffiths is chair of the Friends of Windrush Square and organiser of the exhibition, which was presented jointly with other organisations and with funding from Lambeth council.
Lee Lawrence is the son of Cherry Groce, whose shooting by police – which he witnessed – caused the 1985 Brixton uprising. He is now a leading campaigner for restorative justice and an award-winning author.
They had both stressed to the minister and to Lambeth councillors in the group that the attack on the exhibition had a far-reaching and profound impact on the Windrush Generation and their descendants and that they and the Black community needed to know what the police were doing about it.
The minister agreed that there should be briefings about the progress of the investigation.
The people affected by the attack in the group that met the minister thanked her for visiting in person on a Sunday, but added that this had been the only official acknowledgement of the seriousness of the incident.
Organisers of the exhibition have launched a crowdfunding campaign to restore it.
https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-us-restore-vandalised-windrush-untold-stories-portraits
The person who defaced the windrush exhibition should be given community service that includes 1. made to pay every single penny it will cost to restore the area (no matter how long it takes them and their financial position)2. make a public/personal apology to every person whose image was destroyed with a full account of his actions (mental health issues is an unacceptable excuse)
3. Be involved in restoring the area and to be taught the windrush history and the consequence of his actions on the afro carribbean people