Nicholas Jacobs appeared for a Plea and Case Management Hearing at the Old Bailey. He is charged with the murder of Pc Keith Blakelock who was butchered during the Broadwater Farm Riots in 1985.
Pc Blakelock and his colleague Pc Richard Coombes were attacked during the Broadwater Farm riots in Tottenham in 1985. Coombes was seriously injured but survived. They were trying to protect firefighters when violence spiralled on the estate, sparked by the death of Cynthia Jarrett, 49, who collapsed during a police raid on her home.
Jacobs was 16 at the time that Blakelock was murdered in the most vicious way. Officer Blakelock and his colleague Pc Coombes was was attacked by 300-strong mob as he tried to protect firefighters who were tackling a supermarket blaze at the height of the riot that became known as the Broadwater Farm Riots on October 6, 1985. After stumbling, Blakelock was surrounded by a mob screaming “Kill the pig”. He was stabbed dozens of times. The machete-wielding killers then tried to decapitate him. A later trial heard the mob intended to parade the constable’s head on a pole to taunt other officers.
Three men – Winston Silcott, Mark Braithwaite and Engin Raghip – were convicted in March 1987 of Pc Blakelock’s murder but all three convictions were quashed four and a half years later, after forensic tests on pages of key interview records suggested they had been fabricated.
In 2003, Scotland Yard reopened the murder investigation after a review indicated there were possible new lines of inquiry, and in 2010 14 men were arrested in connection with Pc Blakelock’s death and the attempted murder of his colleague Pc Richard Coombes.
In 2012, the news appeared about a possible prosecution. A few years back, acting on a tip from a new witness, police dug up a back garden at a house near the Broadwater Farm estate in Tottenham. They found a rusting machete. It could be the murder weapon. I hope to hear more about the forensic test results.
To be continued!
UPDATE: Jacobs pleads not guilty