Arrested UK plane spotters were ‘forced’ to plead guilty

FOUR British plane spotters arrested in Kenya as terror suspects only confessed to trespassing ‘under duress’, a relative has claimed.

Peter Swift, whose brother Eddie was one of the quartet detained for taking pictures of aircraft in Nairobi, says the men were threatened with jail terms if they did not admit the charge.

‘I can tell you they pleaded guilty under duress and without any legal representation,’ he told The Mail on Sunday. ‘They were threatened with prison if they didn’t plead guilty.’

The four – Swift and Paul Abbott, both 47, Steve Gibson, 59, and Ian Glover, 46 – have been held by police since last Saturday. Investigators analysed their mobile phones and quickly established that they were not terrorists, but charged them with trespassing instead.

They pleaded guilty last week and are due to reappear in court on Monday where they are expected to be fined and released.

It has also emerged that their families warned them of the danger of travelling to Kenya – where jihadists murdered 67 at a shopping centre in 2013. Mr Gibson’s 80-year-old mother, Sheila, said her son had been a plane spotter since he was 14 and added: ‘I did warn him about Kenya. I said be very careful. He said, “We always are mum, don’t worry”.’

The men, from Greater Manchester, were arrested last Saturday at Wilson Airport, a local hub, and detained in cells at nearby Jomo Kenyatta international airport.

Yesterday they were allowed outside for some air. Mr Swift’s mother, Barbara, 71, said she had received a text from her son. ‘He seemed all right,’ she said. ‘He said they were sitting in the sun so it looks a lot better than stuck in a cell. I didn’t want him to go in the first place.’

Police investigator Joseph Ngisa, said: ‘We had no prior knowledge of how the men would plead. Certainly nobody forced them to say anything, and they can still change their plea via their lawyer if they want to.’