Author: Winston N. Trew
publisher name: Black for a Cause
ISBN: 9781513602080
In March 1972, Winston Trew and three other black men were confronted at the Oval underground station, London, by a group of seven white men claiming to be policemen, who accused them of "nicking handbags." An argument broke into pushing and shoving, and then escalated into a fight. When police arrived, they were arrested as it turned out the white men they were fighting were themselves undercover policemen. They described their experience in the police station as a 'night of dread.' After a 5-week trial at the Old Bailey, the 'Oval 4' were found guilty of attempting to steal, theft, and assault on police. All were jailed for 2 years. In 1973, they were released from prison after a 'successful Appeal.' The Oval 4 episode is an eye-opening event because it not only illustrated the character and contours of Black Power activism in Britain in the 1970s—resistance to police violence and corruption and judicial collusion—it also debunks the myth that the 1960s was the only period of Black Power activism in Britain.
