WRITTEN BY MERYL WALKER
DIRECTED BY SOPHIE FLACK
PRODUCED BY KATE BANNISTER
​LITERARY MANAGER - DAVID BOTTOMLEY
​CAMERA WORK - MICHAEL JOHNSON
SARGE - JOHN RAYMENT
TULLY - VIRGINIA LEE
DIGGER - IAN MAIRS

JACK STUDIO THEATRE
9TH APRIL 2017
5PM & 7.30PM

CHOPPER COPPERS

By Meryl Walker

On 18th June 1984 what should have been a peaceful picket line as part of the UK Miners' Strike, became a violent confrontation between police and miners, subsequently described as 'a brutal example of legalised state violence' and 'a defining and ghastly moment that changed, forever, how this country functions as an economy and as a democracy.'
In June 1991, South Yorkshire Police paid £425,000 in compensation to 39 miners for assault, wrongful arrest, unlawful detention and malicious prosecution. In 2015, the Independent Police Complaints Commission reported that there was "evidence of excessive violence by police officers, a false narrative from police exaggerating violence by miners, perjury by officers giving evidence to prosecute the arrested men, and an apparent cover up of that perjury by senior officers." Following renewed calls for a public inquiry, it was announced by Conservative Party Home Secretary Amber Rudd, that there would be no statutory inquiry or independent review.
Written and produced as part of the Jack Studio Theatre's Writers Workshop, 'Chopper Coppers' asks the question what happens when the state justice system breaks down and can you right an injustice with another injustice?