Tom Cholmondeley

Pretty much all of you know that I am part of the Team Tom lot who run www.justicefortom.com.

Today is the penultimate day for Tom in court in Nairobi. Throughout today and tomorrow, the Defence and Prosecution will sum up the case and then the Assessors will deliberate before making their recommendation to the judge. Thereafter the judge will deliberate and – hopefully fairly swiftly – pronounce his judgment.

Lord knows why I feel such a train wreck, it is hardly my life on the line, nor me who has been suffering – but I guess when you are so close to a situation, the constant adrenaline spikes and troughs just get to you. Today I feel absolutely drained, no idea how Tom or his family and friends in Kenya are feeling but thank goodness we are at the end of what has been pretty much proven to be a travesty.

Should you be interested in the actual case itself, then the court transcripts are published on the site here: http://justicefortom.com/defence/

Fingers crossed this will all be over shortly. I have been to Kamiti Prison to see Tom a few times and every time I am rocked to the core by what the remandees and prisoners have to survive. I am still reeling from my most recent visit – I shall spare you the details; but if one does indeed judge a society by the way it treats its prisoners (let’s ignore the remandees for now) then this Nation needs to have a good hard look at itself.

For the next two days Tom will be in my thoughts, and I hope in the thoughts of those of you who have been affected by this case – although I suspect the time when he most needs our thoughts and prayers will be during the interminable wait for the final judgment.

My thoughts and all love also to Sally Dudmesh (Tom’s love), Lord and Lady Delamere (his ‘rents) and everyone at Jersey Hall who desperately want Tom back.

Am back – and been observing!

Africa, well Kenya, was a cathartic exerience in every way.

I was:

• offline
• seeing Tom and doing something for someone else
• getting my Vit B from the sun
• given an opportunity to spend five peaceful days in great company – should I need it

Primarily the trip was about Tom. I saw him on three separate occasions and am so glad that I made the ‘effort’. It is possibly too soon for me to describe in any detail how the whole thing went – I know, it is frustrating – but it is very emotive to see a friend in prison, especially a high security Kenyan prison. However, I feel better for having seen and hugged him… although it is not so good now being back in a place where I cannot do anything practical to help.

I was not able to see him over the weekend, so was spoiled rotten by his parents and friends… photos on Flickr www.flickr.com/photos/mulquem/

That aside, I did get some peace to consider communication and its variants across the globe. Believe me, being in a country where Internet access is a suspicious luxury is extremely debilitating… yet freeing (discuss!)

On the plane home I believe I had a minor epiphany.

I was standing at the back of the plane and just stretching, avoiding the catatonia of screens and food, when I noticed the diversity of people on the flight. I tell you, the flight back from Nairobi is a wet dream for anthropologists.

Yet every screen was on. Row upon row of people from every background, plugged in to some form of digital entertainment. It was a scary view!

In the seats directly surrounding me, I had two lads, both African – neither had flown before. One sat next to me, the other in front – the one in front was very young, with a nun who was clearly his guardian. Both lads were unsettled throughout the whole flight. Not because of the flight itself, I saw no nerves around take-off or landing – but they were plugged in to a wealth of vision/audio options that they had no real choice but to fiddle about. Neither of them stayed with one channel, audio or visual, for longer than a minute or so… but when they were asked to engage and interact with the screen – then they seemed keen to involve themselves.

I was feeling strangely displaced as – normally – I am the one glued to the computer screen, but I think we need to do more to ensure a balance and ensure that the attraction of digital/social media is managed carefully enough not to make zombies out of all of us.

More when I have had more sleep! And Amy has officially turned six!

Links, libel and law

This has been a week of mixed emotions. I have been very touched by everyone’s comments both on- and off- line about the post on the justicefortom site, and was equally as elated when I found out that I had – finally – been linked to from David Miliband’s blog.

Now, I have to confess that I bullied and nagged to get a link – simply because I harbour a completely unrequited respect for the man (the man not the politics, necessarily).

Within minutes the elation of finally having achieved nirvana was replaced by panic about what his linking to me might mean; not for myself, for him – well for both of us actually – with the death throws of civilserfgate still reverberating around Whitehall. By linking to me, he was seeming to bring my own views and opinions into his own blogosphere and could, perhaps, be seen to be endorsing whatever I say. In light of my post on justicefortom this might not be a good thing for a Foreign Secretary to be doing. Hmm…

I could detail the following 24 hours but it is neither interesting nor relevant – however, I ended up asking someone to remove me from the links on Miliband’s blog, as I was on the point of throwing up if they didn’t!

Of course, they obliged and I felt relieved yet confused.

At lunch the next day I discussed this with a respected colleague and he asked whether by linking to someone are you endorsing all of their views? In the same way as quoting something libellous that someone else has said, in a court of law makes you guilty of libel. Does the same law stand for linking?

By linking to me, was Miliband saying that he endorsed my fight for Tom?

By my linking to anyone, or recommending anyone on this site, does that mean that I endorse every belief they have?

No… but what if it did?

Case study: social media and justice

The title might be a bit of a red herring actually, but I am a bit stuck as to what to call this post.

The challenge

A great friend of mine, Tom Cholmondeley, is imprisoned in Kamiti jail in Nairobi. His friends around the world were frustrated by an inability to get news of his welfare, other than through getting in touch with his – already frustrated – mother, Lady Delamere and girlfriend, Sally Dudmesh. Out of consideration most people left them alone, which caused a sense of isolation and more importantly, robbed Tom of the messages of support and good wishes that might help cheer him through his darkest days.

The solution

I spoke to Sally about how I might be able to help, and we decided that a website which gave Tom a voice and people an opportunity to get messages to him through the site would be a good idea. We came up with a plan using the following as our guideline:

• To give a voice to Tom and those who know and love him
• To publicise what is happening in the trial and Kamiti jail
• To give hope and information to those concerned about Tom and his welfare

Using WordPress, I created a very basic site www.justicefortom.com that enabled Lady Delamere and Sally to post up their latest news of Tom, including details of visits, Tom occasionally sends messages through his mother when she visits him, friends and family could leave messages for Tom and/or his family and Sally or Lady D print and take the comments from the site to Tom.

Understandably there were nerves around publicising what was happening in the trial, so we asked Tom’s lawyer to draft a precis of the trial for the site, and we limit comments on trial days to ‘a mother’s view’, where Lady D just explains how Tom is, looks and feels. We do not post any personal opinions on what is being debated in court.

Team Tom is made up of Lady Delamere, Sally, some close friends of Tom who visit him and myself.

The result

We started receiving comments to the site straight away.

• Friends old and new used it as a personal channel to Tom which made a huge difference to how everyone felt, not least of whom being Tom.
• Lady Delamere and Sally had an avenue to update everyone on what was happening and so felt more supported.
• People who read pieces in the press were being directed to it and were able to post their own opinions – some not in line with the feelings of the family – but enabled the family to respond to criticism or mis-conception.

Very quickly it got Press attention and was linked to by the Sunday Times and Channel 4. Most recently we received the following message from the BBC:

I realise this is not the best moment to send you a message, given that you will all no doubt be completely focused on the upcoming court date. But I wonder whether it might be a request you could think over at a more convenient time.

I develop documentaries for the BBC, and would be very interested in trying to make a film with Tom, and the Justice for Tom group.

This would not be a news report, but a long form 60-minute film in which we could communicate more fully what this experience has been like for all of you.

As I said, I realise this will not be something you’ll want to think about right now. But I would really appreciate it if you could give it some thought at an appropriate time for you. For the moment, really, I would value the opportunity just of establishing contact with a view perhaps of discussing the idea at a later date.

I believe that it has achieved everything that we wanted it to.

Note: I was especially touched when a great and talented friend of mine: Dave Briggs – who does not know Tom – offered to weave his magic on the site and give us a new look that helped people use it more easily. I think it looks amazing and you can now see it – the site you are looking at is a professional version of my amateur effort, as from 17th March 2008.

Ponderings

I believe that in this day and age of information availability, (both online and off: through social media and the Freedom of Information Act), everyone can benefit from using the right tools in the right way. This is just one example of how it has worked very well. I would love to hear of others, and I also wonder how sites like these will start to play a part in ensuring justice is done – with a jury of peers that are unselected.