Scotland Yard has said it will make public the key findings of a review into arrests made around the coronation but the Metropolitan police assistant commissioner Louisa Rolfe declined to say when and defended her officers’ right to make arrests without evidence.
At a hearing of the London assembly’s police and crime committee, Rolfe said officers in central London had been acting on a “developing intelligence picture” when they detained 64 people, of whom 42 remain on bail pending investigation.
The Met has come under fire after it emerged that those arrested last month included a pro-royal architect who accidentally got swept up, a group of activists from the Republic group who had been given high-level approval for their protest and two women’s safety volunteers. The Met commissioner, Mark Rowley, has admitted some of the arrests were “regrettable”.
The mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has ordered a review of the policing operation and his deputy Sophie Linden, told the assembly’s committee they had been concerned by a number of detentions on the day. “The mayor has also asked that the high-level conclusions of that review are made public because it’s really important in terms of transparency and accountability,” Linden said.
Rolfe and the deputy assistant commissioner Ade Adelekan told assembly members officers had acted after receiving intelligence of plans to disturb King Charles III’s coronation procession on the day before the event.
Rolfe said: “Of course, intelligence is not evidence but the way that we work and we operate is that we have to respond swiftly to a developing intelligence picture. And it may not always be feasible or practical to ensure evidence before an arrest is made that you know, under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, an arrest is made on the basis of reasonable grounds.”
Adelekan told the committee: “The intelligence was significant enough and worried us enough that senior colleagues were briefed late on the Friday night and into the Saturday and I suggest that senior political colleagues were briefed on the detail of some of the intelligence just to show the significance.”
Graham Smith, the head of Republic, who was one of six organisers of an agreed protest at Trafalgar Square who were detained for 16 hours in a police cell, said he was concerned the Met had not approached his group for their views as part of the review.
Smith said: “I would appreciate some engagement with the mayor so that he is aware of all these issues themselves and isn’t going to be misled by whatever review they do.”
