A Palestine Action activist sentenced to jail as a terrorist over a raid at an Israeli-linked defence factory was “stitched up”, her mother says.
Leona “Ellie” Kamio was among four defendants jailed after causing £1.2 million of damage at Elbit Systems factory near Bristol in August 2024.
But legal experts and campaigners have warned the judge’s decision to sentence on the basis the raid was an “act of terrorism” – without telling the jury – was “chilling”.
“I think it’s quite clear that all the rules of democracy have gone completely out of the window,” Kamio’s mother Emma told The Independent.
Arguing her daughter was not treated fairly because the jury did not know the defendants could be sentenced as terrorists, Ms Kamio warned the “slippery slope to authoritarianism was already here”.
“They haven’t had a fair trial,” Ms Kamio said. “The jury did not know what was ahead of them. The whole thing’s been a stitch-up.”
Having previously been acquitted on charges of aggravated burglary in a trial in February this year, her 30-year-old daughter faced retrial with the new restrictions.
Along with Samuel Corner, 23, Fatema Rajwani, 21, and Charlotte Head, 30, the group was found guilty of criminal damage.
Corner was additionally convicted of grievous bodily harm without intent, after striking Sgt Kate Evans with a sledgehammer and fracturing her spine. Between them they have been sentenced to 26 years and 4 months in prison, with Kamio receiving a six years prison sentence.
Hundreds gathered outside the court room to hear the sentencing, with Kamio shouting: “In order to hear the birds, the warplanes must be silent,” referencing Palestinian poet Marwan Makhoul.
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Two other defendants – Zoe Rogers, 22, and Jordan Devlin, 31 – were acquitted of the same charge by a jury at Woolwich Crown Court last month.
Ms Kamio described her daughter as a “geek who had never been in trouble before”. As a teenage musician she was part of an up and coming band that signed to Island records, the same label that made Amy Winehouse and U2 famous, among many others.
She later went on to work for Vice magazine before becoming a teacher at a private day school in Walthamstow, London. Described as a nature lover, her dream is to live on farm and tend to the land. Her school has since said she is always welcome to return to her job.
“If you took at look at them, they are six geeks,” Ms Kamio, who was also arrested by riot police in connection with the crime and later released, said of the defendants. “You’ve got four young girls, three of them are autistic, they’re all university boffins who’ve never been in trouble in their life.”
As part of their punishment, the so-called Filton 4 will spend an additional year on licence and be subject to 15 years of terrorist notification requirements, informing authorities of their every move years after their release.
The case marks the first time that protesters have been sentenced as terrorists for property damage without the intention to harm a person. At the heart of the case is the ongoing anger over the treatment of the Palestinians, which has sparked regular protests in cities including London and Bristol.
Like many protesters, Kamio found it difficult to watch what was happening in the war-torn enclave, where authorities say more than 20,000 children have been killed since October 2023, and felt she had to do something. A UN investigation has since found Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinians, although the state denies the claims.
“She was working in Forest with these young children whose concept of right and wrong is very simple,” her mother says. “It’s black and white. Then, she would go home and see young children losing families, being scared, not having a home and that’s what fired her up.
“Nelson Mandela was classed as a terrorist and now there’s a statue of him in parliament,” she added.
Ms Kamio says her daughter’s sentencing has already had a wider effect on the family’s lives, claiming she has since been turned down for a mortgage after lenders argued she could cause the company “reputational damage”.
Kamio’s previous boss, former Vice editor-in-chief Zing Tseng, also took to social media to criticise the case.
“She’s been sentenced as a terrorist even though she has been convicted of criminal damage,” Tseng said of her former employee. “To me, it is absolutely nuts and it hits home because I worked with her.
“If you walk down east London on a night out, there are 10,000 Ellies having a girly drink with their friends and then on Monday they’re going to do their social media job. This could be literally any one of us. It massively opens the door for anyone taking direct action to be sentenced as a terrorist.”
The sentences have also been condemned by MPs, lawyers, rights groups, campaigners and celebrities. Sally Rooney, Greta Thunberg, Steve Coogan, and Lord John Hendy KC, Paul Gilroy, Zoe Wanamaker, John McDonnell MP are among those who have signed a letter calling the sentencing “unjust”.
Rosalind Burgin, barrister at the firm that represented Kamio Garden Court North chambers, said: “What’s particularly novel in this case is that criminal damage alone – so nothing to do with violence against a person, nothing to do with harming a person at all – is being tried as a terrorism offence.
“We don’t know of any other case where that has happened. There have been cases where murder has been sentenced with a terrorism connection but not this.”
“It’s property alone and no suggestion of violence against a person. That’s the bit that’s completely unprecedented…. If this continues, it’s a real threat to wider protest.”
The Independent has contacted the Crown Prosecution Service and Judicial Office for comment. The Ministry of Justice referred comment to the Judicial Office.
Deanna Heer KC, the lead prosecutor in the case, argued that the activists had wanted to influence the UK and Israeli government saying that the “ideology” of Palestine Action was to “liberate Palestine from Israel”.
She said that a training manual referring to Britain’s “imperial” role in the Middle East demonstrated that the raid was attempting to further a political cause.
“Inside the warehouse, they set about destroying as much property as they could,” she said.
Justice Johnson accepted the prosecution’s argument and found it sufficient to establish a “terrorist connection”.
“Ms Heer submits that the defendants’ conduct was carried out for the purpose of advancing a political or ideological cause,” read the sentencing court document.
“She relies on evidence that shows that Palestine Action’s aims included influencing government decisions or policy in opposition to the arms trade in the United Kingdom insofar as it supports Israel, and intimidating targets in its campaign to ‘shut Elbit down’. Ms Heer submits those are plainly political and ideological causes.”
In his sentencing remarks, Justice Johnson added: “I am sure that each defendant’s offence of criminal damage involved serious damage to property, was designed to influence the UK government and to intimidate a section of the public and was for the purpose of advancing an ideological or political cause.”
Days after the sentencing, the Court of Appeal ruled Palestine Action’s ban under terrorism laws was lawful, in a major win for the government.
The group was banned by then-home secretary Yvette Cooper in July 2025 after members broke into RAF Brize Norton and vandalised jets to protest the war in Gaza.
Lady Chief Justice Baroness Carr told the Court of Appeal on Monday that the government’s decision to proscribe the group was “a justified and proportionate interference with individual rights”.
Baroness Carr said that it was “not accurate” to describe Palestine Action as “an ordinary protest group”, saying the group was “engaged in causing serious damage to property” and “presented a very real risk of injury not only to property but also to members of the public”.
In their ruling, the Court of Appeal judges said Palestine Action “had little or nothing in common with the suffragettes or the anti-apartheid or Iran war protest groups”.
