Piers Corbyn has been arrested for breaching lockdown – while standing trial for attending two previous rallies against COVID-19 restrictions.
The 73-year-old campaigner and brother of Jeremy Corbyn, from East Street, was arrested at 5pm on Saturday, November 28, while giving a speech in Piccadilly Circus and was released ten hours later. A decision on charges is expected by the end of the week.
As the News has reported, Corbyn – a well known housing and squatting activist in Southwark – has attended a number of anti-lockdown protests.
Alongside claiming the restrictions are an attack on civil liberties, and that the COVID-19 virus is vastly overstated, he has also criticised mass vaccination plans and is a 5G conspiracy theorist.
Currently mid-trial at Westminster Magistrates’ Court over previous lockdown breaches, Corbyn appeared in the dock on Friday, November 27. The case is expected to continue tomorrow (Wednesday, December 2).
Corbyn, who had also turned his court appearance into a megaphone-waving demonstration, believes he is being made an example of by the authorities while police have not followed similar enforcement with Black Lives Matter protests; a claim the Met denies. Police say Corbyn had refused to move on when requested. He views his trial as a ‘test case’ which could see similar lockdown fines and prosecutions rendered void
The activist is now embodied in a number of legal battles with different police forces after attending numerous anti-lockdown events across the UK in May, and throughout the second wave of restrictions this autumn.