Just Stop Oil protesters guilty of causing public nuisance over motorway bridge stunt

The anti-fossil fuel group have accused the Government of ‘suicidal’ climate policies (Picture: Just Stop Oil)

Two Just Stop Oil protesters who shut down the Dartford Bridge last year by climbing onto cables have been found guilty of causing a public nuisance.

Morgan Trowland and Marcus Decker scaled the Queen Elizabeth II Bridge which links the M25 in Essex and Kent, with traffic shut on October 17.

Basildon Crown Court found the pair guilty today of public nuisance, an action that obstructs, damages or inconveniences the community.

The prosecution described how the demonstrators unfurled a ‘giant Just Stop Oil banner’ and ‘rigged up hammocks’ when they climbed 200-feet above the road.

This caused ‘gridlock for miles’, prosecutor Adam King said.

‘It was because of the disruption that the incident made national news,’ he said.

‘Morgan Trowland, while up there, arranged interviews with the press and posted on social media from a Just Stop Oil account.

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The pair climbed the bridge in the early morning (Picture: Just Stop Oil)

‘One post was a video of him setting out the group’s demand that the government immediately stop issuing oil licences.’

The bridge was closed from 4am October 17 to 9pm the following day, Mr King added.

Trowland, a civil engineer, and Decker, a teacher, stepped down from the bridge with the help of police and a cherry picker at around 5.30pm.

Mr King told the court: ‘Small businesses lost, in some cases, hundreds of thousands of pounds, people missed loved one’s funerals, children were left on the side of the road waiting for buses.’

Trowland had said in evidence: ‘We climbed it (the bridge) to deliver a warning message, to put up a banner saying Just Stop Oil and to speak that message through interviews with journalists.’

He said the climate change group are hoping the Government will stop licencing oil and gas production, ‘which is putting fuel on the fire of climate change,’ he said.

Decker and Trowland ascended more than 200 feet above the road (Picture: PA) Decker stayed up in the air by lying in a hammock (Picture: Twitter/Just Stop Oil)

Trowland, of Islington, north London, and Decker, 34, of no fixed address, denied causing a public nuisance.

They were found guilty by a jury following more than two hours of deliberations.

The two will be sentenced on April 13 with Judge Shane Collery KC remanding them in custody.

‘This court is considering custodial sentences,’ he said, adding: ‘We’re dealing with significant nuisance that’s been caused.’

Decker said at the time of the stunt: ‘Too many people in this country simply don’t know the scale and intensity of climate breakdown as the scientists describe it.

Accusing the political system of ‘betraying the people of this country’, he added: ‘Why isn’t the most existential threat that humanity has ever faced on the news every day?’

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