EN33

This article is part of the Undercover Research Portal at Powerbase - investigating corporate and police spying on activists

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Part of a series on National Public Order Intelligence Unit
'EN33'
Alias:	unknown
Deployment:	early 2000s
Role:	undercover

EN33 is the cipher given to a former undercover officer of the National Public Order Intelligence Unit who was deployed in early years of the unit to infiltrate a number of groups. The Undercover Policing Inquiry has ruled that it will restrict both the officer's real and cover names. Has retired from police.

• For the EN cipher system see EN officers page.

As a police officer

According to documents released by the Undercover Policing Inquiry, on joining the police he was in uniformed duties. In this period he was involved in arresting and interview activists. He then had a role as a Test Purchasing Officer (TPO).

Subsequent to be being a TPO, they were seconded to the NPOIU in the early years of that unit. Large numbers of photos relating to the groups that EN33 targeted exist on the internet, and photographs and video was taken of him while he was undercover.

On taking up undercover work they made effort to avoid being traced. They are particularly worried that those who they arrested as a test purchasing officer or those activists they arrested and interviewed will recognise them and take revenge - he is concerned about violence from those he targeted.

After leaving the NPOIU they continued to do undercover work, focused on serious and organised crime, taking part in significant operations. Also at risk due to role in including arrest and conviction of a major drug dealer. Later given an overt role in which they gave evidence at court.

In the Undercover Policing Inquiry

• 2 May 2018: Mitting indicates he is minded to restrict real and cover names, writing:

"Although it would be desirable for members of the targeted groups to know the cover name of EN33, so as to be in a position to provide and give evidence about the deployments, that is not possible without a disproportionate and unjustified interference with the right to respect for the private and family life of EN33. It is desirable that EN33 should give evidence in public about the deployments, in which event precautionary measures will be required to preserve anonymity and it is unlikely that the whole of the evidence which can be provided by EN33 can be given in public, even with precautionary measures in place."

• 9 July 2018: Inquiry releases gisted version of the open restriction order application, open statement and risk assessment for the officer and Mitting directed that any submissions in response to these applications were to be made by 20 July 2018.

• 30 October 2018, Mitting notes difficulties to be resolved in handling of evidence in relation to this officer's deployment and its management. However, he rules in favour of anonymity for the officer in both real and cover names, writing:

The risk to EN33 is not founded upon the test purchasing of drugs or upon the arrest and conviction of a "major drug dealer". Nor, in my judgement, is it founded on undercover work in serious and organised crime. 14. The fact that the application for a restriction order - not the risk assessment -is "officer led", so that the starting premise for assessment is reliant upon the officer's recollection of events and understanding of risk to themselves and third parties, does not mean that that either the risk assessment or my own assessment of risk is solely, or even mainly, dependent upon the officer's recollection and understanding.

On a fair reading of the risk assessor's assessment of the risk of the revelation of the real name of EN33 should t he pseudonym be revealed, it is that the developments which he anticipates as highly likely to occur raise the risk of disclosure to "medium". The apparent contradiction is not real.

I accept that it will be difficult to devise means by which evidence about the deployment of EN33 can be made public without compromising the restriction order which I make. It is obvious that a full and detailed account of the deployment of EN33 would do so. Something less than that will be required. Precisely what can be made public must await detailed consideration later.

The risk assessor assesses that the risk of harm to EN33 in the event that the real name is disclosed is "high". I remain satisfied that it is real, but do not feel able to make a more precise assessment than that. Nevertheless, I remain convinced that it would be neither proportionate nor justified to run that risk. The submissions made are, understandably, coy about the "alternative means" by which that risk may be mitigated. They would involve the wholesale disruption of the private and family life of EN33. Nothing about the deployment of EN33 which I know now, or which would be likely to emerge should the cover name be disclosed, could justify that disruption.