By Jamie Holland-
Arrested and charged with the murder or Garry Newlove in 2007, the now 26 year old Jordan Cunliffe continues to live behind bars despite not laying a finger on the deceased as well as being registered blind. The eye of media.com will now join Unilad
and the mother of Jordan, Janet Cunlife, in campaigning for his urgent release , after what was clearly an injustice in jailing him for murder under the flawed principle of joint enterprise.
Jordan’s conviction is a result of the highly controversial Joint Enterprise law, a ruling which permits witnesses of murder who do not try to prevent it to be given the same conviction as the one administering or carrying out the attack. The disputable law dates back some 300 years ago and was reinstated by David Cameron’s Tory government in an effort to crack down on gang crimes.
Newlove, a 47 year old father of three died from a kick to the neck a decade ago, following the confrontation of a group of 15 young vandals outside his family home in Warrington. Cunliffe, aged 15 at the time of attack, was convicted at trial and sentenced despite not leaving a scratch on Newlove. Alongside him were Adam Swellings (then 19) and Stepehn Sorton (then 17) with Sorton delivering the fatal blow.
EYE CONDITION
Given that Cunliffe also suffers with Keratoconus, a severe degenerative eye condition that distorts vision, he could not have possibly have witnessed the attack to the same degree as if his vision was perfectly intact, raising the question of how he was supposed to have realised the true extent of the crime in order to prevent it. It is because of this that his mother, Janet Cunliffe, has been campaigning to overturn her son’s conviction and strive towards the abolition of the Joint Enterprise Law “so [that] innocent people don’t go to prison”.
When Janet spoke to UNILAD, she argued that her son’s disability was overlooked by the court and that “Joint Enterprise says your presence at the scene is somehow a form of encouragement to those who are actually committing the violence.
You’d expect DNA and forensics and CCTV footage [would convict someone] but it’s not. It’s just what they say might be going on in your head at the time and what you may know or think”
PREPOSTEROUS
Janet also added that, given her son’s lifelong sight impairment, she regarded the sentence to be ‘preoposterous’ and “even if he was at the scene, he wouldn’t have been able to see what anyone else was doing”. Indeed, Janet tells of how her life has been “destroyed” by “a common law for common people that has no common sense”.
Janet continued by arguing, “my son couldn’t be a witness for the prosecution because he couldn’t tell who’d done it or what had happened. He also couldn’t defend himself against the prosecution. He was the perfect target”,
“I think they hand-picked Jordan for tha reason. He couldn’t give evidence to defend himself because he couldn’t see. He didn’t know where he was and he didn’t know who was stood next to him”.
Janet, now an active member of Joint Enterprise Not Gulty By Association, works to help families of allegedly wrongfully convicted citizens. The organisation has so far helped over 800 and has held protests across the nation in an effort to change a law which she claims has “destroyed” her life.
Having lived his entire adult life so far behind bars for a murder he didn’t commit, Janet laments on how her son will adjust to life once he is finally released from prison.
REVIEW
The Commons Justice Committee was called to urgently review the Joint Enterprise Law in 2014 and suggested those who are merely witnesses to such an attack but refrain from it’s encouragement should be convicted with lighter offences. His case also continues to be reviewed by the CCRC (Criminal Case Review Commission) which leaves the nation waiting in limbo as to whether or not Cunliffe will gain the justice he deserves.