{"id":1130660,"date":"2021-12-18T13:59:01","date_gmt":"2021-12-18T18:59:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1130660"},"modified":"2021-12-18T13:59:02","modified_gmt":"2021-12-18T18:59:02","slug":"black-lives-matter-statue-toppling-an-act-of-love-court-told","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/black-lives-matter-statue-toppling-an-act-of-love-court-told\/","title":{"rendered":"Black Lives Matter Statue Toppling an &#039;Act of Love&#039;, Court Told"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">22<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fblack-lives-matter-statue-toppling-an-act-of-love-court-told%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1130660&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/GettyImages-1322273900-e1639673532104-640x335-1.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" \/><\/div>\n<p class=\"subheading\">The toppling of a statue during a Black Lives Matter protest last year was an \u201cact of love\u201d, a court has been told.<\/p>\n<p>The toppling of a statue of 17th-century merchant Edward Colston during a Black Lives Matter protest last year has been called an \u201cact of love\u201d.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"D-ROS-B1\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B1\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"gmxrevmore\" class=\"H\"><\/figure>\n<p>Defendant&nbsp;Sage Willoughby made the comment during his trial at Bristol Crown Court on Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p>According to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/uk-england-bristol-59686345\">the<\/a> BBC, Willoughby and three other defendants have been accused of causing criminal damage during the Black Lives Matter protest, which took place in the city in June of 2020.<\/p>\n<p>All four have denied the charge.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B2\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<p>Willoughby, who claims to have been signing petitions to have the statue removed since he was 11, compared its presence to having a \u201cHitler statue in front of a Holocaust survivor\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHaving a statue of someone of that calibre in the middle of the city I believe is an insult, and I will continue to believe that whatever the outcome of this [trial],\u201d GB News <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gbnews.uk\/news\/edward-colston-black-lives-matter-protester-calls-the-toppling-of-the-slave-traders-statue-an-act-of-love\/183997?utm_source=ground.news&amp;utm_medium=referral\">reports<\/a> the defendant as saying.<\/p>\n<p>He also said that he was surprised at the time by the fact that it was able to be toppled.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is not something I expected was possible \u2013 when it happened I was as much surprised as thrilled and happy,\u201d Willoughby said, saying that the only comparative reference for the incident he had at the time was the toppling of a statue of Saddam Hussein in Iraq, where vehicles were used.<\/p>\n<p>When&nbsp;William Hughes QC, prosecuting, remarked that the statue of Saddam Hussein had been toppled during a time of conflict, and not during a peaceful march, Willoughby replied: \u201cThis is a time of conflict, racial inequality is a time of conflict.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B3\" class=\"a8d adSo\"><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cUntil equality is reached, it is a time of conflict,\u201d the defendant reiterated.<\/p>\n<p>Willoughby also rejected the notion that he was acting violently.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat was not an act of violence, that was an act of love for my fellow man,\u201d the defendant claimed.<\/p>\n<p>When it was put to Willoughby that the march was \u201cabout people coming together to make a difference for black lives\u201d and that \u201cthere was no need to take any further action\u201d, the 22-year-old said that he disagreed.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t think I was thinking about the legal repercussions, I know the difference between right and wrong and that\u2019s all that was going through my mind at that point,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>The trial is ongoing as of the time of publication.<\/p>\n<h5 class=\"western\"><em><span>Follow Breitbart London on Facebook:<\/span><\/em><em>&nbsp;<\/em><em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/BreitbartLondon\/\"><span>Breitbart London<\/span><\/a><\/em><\/h5>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The toppling of a statue during a Black Lives Matter protest last year was an \u201cact of love\u201d, a court has been told. The toppling of a statue of 17th-century &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":297,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1130660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1130660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/297"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1130660"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1130660\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1130660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1130660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1130660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}