A LAMPETER university professor helped secure the conviction of two ultra-racists and set a legal landmark after giving expert evidence during a dramatic trial. It was a day like any other until Prof Dan Cohn- Sherbok, a Reform Rabbi and lecturer in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies, took a call at his desk from the counter-terrorism section of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS). Two men, 51-year-old Simon Sheppard and 42- year-old Stephen Whittle, stood accused of inciting racial hatred after publishing a series of online arti- cles that scathingly attacked Judaism and denied the holocaust, whilst claiming that Anne Frank’s famous diary was fiction “written for her own amusement”. The conversation saw Prof Cohn-Sherbok recruited to give evidence for the prosecution in a trial at Leeds Crown Court, where he would later argue that Jews should be regarded as a ‘racial’ group - crucial for the charge to stick - rather than merely a religious one. “Essentially, these two had been using the internet to disseminate hateful material about Jews, blacks, women and others”, he said. “My brief was this: are the Jews a religious group or an ethnic group? “The distinction can be critical, because the law is different for each. “I had to ask for the meaning of ‘ethnic group’, and was given criteria from a previous court case about Sikhs - in that case, at the House of Lords, it was ruled that there were seven criteria, including a common language, being a minority, having a long history, etc. “Obviously the history of the Jews goes back to biblical times, which is nearly 4,000 years ago. “And Jews have the sacred language of Hebrew.” Jurors found both men guilty after three days of deliberations, but they fled to the United States, claiming political asylum, before being sentenced. Both remain in detention whilst their case is decided. Prof Cohn-Sherbok, himself from the US state of Colorado, returned to Leeds a second time for a further trial - conducted in the defendant’s absence - regarding a publication, Tales of the Holohoax, that the jury couldn’t decide on the first time round. “I made same case again”, he said, “and explained why the material was really anti-semetic and not just satire. “They accepted my argument, and this is of partic- ular importance because the Attorney-General was watching the case closely. “If they had been acquitted, [she] may have had to declare that anti-semitism wasn’t punishable by law. “It really is of critical importance to the British Jews - it means they’re protected by the law.”

Copyright Tindle Newspapers Ltd 21 January 09

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