A journalist investigating voting fraud in the UK was attacked yesterday while on a reporting job.
Jerome Taylor was repeatedly punched and kick by the group of attackers, who approached him in Bow, east London, where Taylor was looking to speak to a local election candidate about allegations of postal vote fraud.
He describes the ordeal in an article on Independent.co.uk today:
I don’t know how long it lasted – it was probably only a minute – but it was a long minute. I don’t remember them saying anything as they did it. The first noise I was aware of was the beeping of a car horn and a woman screaming.
The noise brought a man out of a nearby block of flats. With little regard for his own safety he waded in and defended me until my attackers ran away.
Sadly and globally the messenger is being increasingly beaten up, incarcerated or killed. The figures are alarming. And this at a time when the art and importance of impartial reporting has never been valued lower by those who own newspapers and broadcast and new media.