A whistleblower has told the public inquiry into undercover policing that two senior officers who supervised a Scotland Yard unit spying on political campaigns were 'horribly and incredibly' racist. Peter Francis, a former member of the Metropolitan Police's special demonstration squad (SDS), testified that one regularly used the 'N-word', while the other used a repertoire of explicit racist slurs.
Francis, the only undercover officer to blow the whistle on the SDS, gave evidence on Monday about his time in the unit during the 1990s. He described hearing 'racist banter' among officers and said the unit monitored the campaign run by the family of Stephen Lawrence after his murder in 1993, as well as thousands of mainly leftwing political activists.
According to Francis, special branch, which directed the SDS, was '100% racist' towards the Lawrence family, viewing them 'as unable to think for themselves or come up with and run their campaign themselves, so it was considered they must be being led by someone else'. The inquiry is examining how and why the SDS collected information about Doreen and Neville Lawrence and their supporters. The Met has apologised for putting the Lawrences under surveillance.
Francis named Det Ch Supt Robert Potter, a senior special branch officer who oversaw the SDS, as 'horribly racist'. He claimed Potter, known as 'Potty Bob', used the 'N-word' to describe black justice campaigns and stressed the importance of stopping them. Potter, who is now dead, had denied the allegations. The head of the SDS during Francis's early deployment, identified only as HN86, was also 'incredibly racist', Francis said, referring to black justice campaigners as 'monkeys' who were 'led by the ring through their noses'. HN86 denies the claims and is taking legal action to avoid being questioned by the inquiry.
The inquiry, led by retired judge Sir John Mitting, was established in 2014 after Francis revealed the SDS's covert operations to the Guardian. About 139 undercover officers spied on tens of thousands of activists between 1968 and at least 2010. Francis is giving evidence over four days this week.
