A UK artist named Reuben Powell is a well known figure in London's Elephant & Castle district. Powell has been photographing and drawing local people and places for 25 years.
Last week Powell was searched by police under the Anti-Terrorism Act and incarcerated for five hours for the 'crime' of taking photographs.
Independent:
With a studio near the 1960s shopping centre at the heart of this area in south London, he (Powell) is a familiar figure and is regularly seen snapping and sketching the people and buildings around his home – currently the site of Europe's largest regeneration project. But to the police officers who arrested him last week his photographing of the old HMSO print works close to the local police station posed an unacceptable security risk.
"The car skidded to a halt like something out of Starsky & Hutch and this officer jumped out very dramatically and said 'what are you doing?' I told him I was photographing the building and he said he was going to search me under the Anti-Terrorism Act," he recalled.
For Powell, this brush with the law resulted in five hours in a cell after police seized the lock-blade knife he uses to sharpen his pencils. His release only came after the intervention of the local MP, Simon Hughes, but not before he was handcuffed and his genetic material stored permanently on the DNA database.
In the UK it isn't unusual for photographers working in public areas to receive warnings from the police and officials. A number have been stopped under Section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000. Journalists and trainwatchers have also been harassed.
MP Austin Mitchell Tabled a motion in parliament objecting to the harassment photographers can run into by virtue of simply going about their business. The National Union of Journalists (NUJ) is also fighting back.
Independent:
The National Union of Journalists (NUJ) has also taken up the cause, highlighting the case last month of the photographer Jess Hurd, whose camera was taken from her when she was detained for 45 minutes under Section 44 while documenting a traveller wedding in London's Docklands. Last week police were filmed obstructing photographers covering a protest at the Greek embassy in London. Scotland Yard promised to investigate.
The harassment of photographers in the UK is similar to a case I posted on recently involving a Sydney, Australia resident named Nick Hac. He was harassed by the police for shooting video with his Blackberry - story here.
