Bob Lambert Gallery

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



Part of a series on
undercover police officers
Robert Lambert
PX A 07.016.jpg
Alias: Bob Robinson
Deployment: 1983 or 1984[1] until 1988
Unit:
Targets:
Animal liberation and anti-authoritarian movements

This page brings together all the publicly available photographs of Bob Lambert as 'Bob Robinson’ and Bob Lambert in his later life. Almost all extant publicly available pictures of Lambert not in his ‘Bob Robinson’ persona are from his years as a ‘public person’; that is to say as an academic towards the end of or after his service in the Metropolitan Police. Any photographs of Bob Lambert pictured earlier than 2007 would be most gratefully received.

Where known, any date, location, subject and rights information will be given with a picture. Corrections and additions welcome, if you know when and where a photo was taken, or if you have material to add to the gallery, please get in touch.

Also see main page Bob Lambert and Bob Lambert Career Timeline

+++++ Last Updated November 2016 +++++

Bob Lambert as 'Bob Robinson' Gallery

Exposure by London Greenpeace and first reports (October 2011)

When former members of London Greenpeace exposed Bob Lambert as a former police infiltrator at the ‘One Society Many Cultures’ anti-racism conference[2][3] he was due to speak at on 15 October 2011, they also handed out an illustrated leaflet entitled The truth about Bob Lambert and his Special Branch role.[4] The leaflet, along with an account of the ambush, was posted to Indymedia the same day.[5]

A photograph from the hand-out, of Lambert as ‘Robinson’ participating in a picket against dairy products company Unigate outside the London Dorchester Hotel in September 1984,[6] was then republished alongside an article in The Guardian on 16 October 2011.[7] The photos of Lambert in green were taken by Martyn Lowe at his house in East Twickenham, he considered himself a good friend. The first was used to expose Lambert, the second with a wider frame was published by The Guardian on 23 October 2011.[8] More recently, a photo turned up that was taken a few moments apart.

More relationships (June 2013)

Early 2012, The Guardian reported how Lambert had entered into intimate relationships with several women whilst he was undercover, and had borne a son with one of them. The paper published a photograph of ‘Robinson’ holding his son.[10]

The following summer The Guardian published a story detailing the intimate relationships with targets which undercover officers embarked upon. Illustrating the story was a picture of Lambert with his then-girlfriend Belinda Harvey (AKA ‘Karen’).[11] Shortly afterwards, to tie in with the publication of the Evans & Lewis book Undercover, The Guardian published both an interview with Jacqui, the animal rights activist with whom he had a son, and a gallery of pictures of various undercover police officers. Together the features included three photos of Lambert.[12][13][14]

Dispatches: The police's dirty secret, Channel 4 (24 June 2013)

Guardian, journalist Paul Lewis also worked with Channel 4 documentary strand Dispatches to produce an episode on the ongoing undercover policing scandal entitled ‘The Police's Dirty Secret’, which was broadcast on 24 June 2013.[15] As well as featuring Bob Lambert's former protégé turned SDS whistle-blower Peter Francis, both of ‘Bob Robinson’'s long-term partners from his undercover tour, Jacqui and Belinda Harvey, also gave onscreen interviews. A large number of previously unpublished still photographs of ‘Robinson’ from his time in the mid-80s animal liberation scene were shown.

In a report on the growing campaign to have Lambert sacked from his position at London Metropolitan University, a BBC News package included a still photograph of ‘Bob Robinson’ with a small child. No further details about it are known.[16]

Bob Lambert as a public person gallery

This section brings together a number of publicly available photographs of Robert Lambert from both before and after his exposure as a former police infiltrator. Where known, any date, location, subject and rights information will be given with a picture.

Islamic Human Rights Commission's 10th anniversary (11 November 2007)

Shortly before his retirement from the Metropolitan Police in December 2007, Lambert was invited to the tenth anniversary celebrations of the Islamic Human Rights Commission, where he was presented with an award for his work with IHRC and the wider Muslim community. The award was inscribed “In appreciation for his integrity and commitment to promoting a fair, just and secure society for all, which, is a rarity and will be greatly missed”.[18]

‘Stop Islamophobia, defend the Muslim community’ conference (5 June 2010)

In June 2010 Lambert was a prominently featured speaker at an anti-Islamophobia conference organised by the Stop The War Coalition and the British Muslim Initiative (and supported by CND, Cordoba Foundation, Federation of Student Islamic Societies, Islam Channel, Islamic Forum of Europe, Islamophobia Watch, London Muslim Centre, Muslim Welfare House, National Union of Journalists, North London Central Mosque, Palestine Solidarity Campaign and Unite). Fellow speakers included Imran Khan, the lawyer for the family of Stephen Lawrence, and Lambert defender Daud Abdullah.[19][20][21]

Book launch (7 September 2011)

Lambert's book, Countering Al-Qaeda in London: Police and Muslims in Partnership, is presented at the Houses of Parliament, hosted by Jeremy Corbyn MP, Cordoba Foundation and the Council for Arab-British Understanding, organised by the “sophisticated and focused public affairs company” Raitt Orr & Associates.[22] Photo from The Tanjara webblog in a report of the event.[23]

Book launch (19 September 2011)

Presentation at the International Institute for Strategic Studies at the occasion of the publishing of his book Countering Al-Qaeda. The meeting was chaired by Nigel Inkster, Director of Transnational Threats and Political Risk. Listen to the discussion here.[24]

Exposure and post-exposure, October 2011 and onwards

Exposure (15 October 2011)

Lambert's final public appearance before his exposure was as a platform speaker at the Unite Against Fascism/One Society Many Cultures-organised one-day anti-racism conference held in London, 15 October 2011.[2][3] Outraged that a police spied, who had infiltrated and disrupted anti-fascist groups, was now afforded a platform at an anti-racist event by organisers oblivious of his past, a group of five former London Greenpeace activists decided to attend. After Lambert had finished his presentation, the London Greenpeace veterans began to heckle him from the floor, demanding that he acknowledge that he had been a police spy. Lambert kept his counsel and slipped out of the conference venue - the headquarters of the British trade union movement, Congress House in Central London - only to be followed onto the street by the activists, who continued to film him whilst demanding an apology from him for spying on them.[4][25][26]

Post-exposure television exposure (30 June/1 July 2013)

The only broadcast interview with Bob Lambert following his exposure in October 2011 was with Andy Davies for Channel 4 News, possibly filmed at his home.[27][28][29] It should be noted that having remained silent - apart from a response to SpinWatch in October 2011[30] and his press release-like ‘preliminary commentary’ of February 2012[31] - for a year and a half, he decided to go on television just a fortnight after Caroline Lucas publicly raised the allegation that he was responsible for the 1986 Harrow Debenhams fire.[32][33][34][35]

New Yorker (25 August 2014)

Using a number of photographs of both ‘Bob Robinson’ and Bob Lambert, artist Alex Williamson created this collage to illustrate an extensive article in the New Yorker magazine by Lauren Collins, which was centred around Jacqui, the animal rights activist whom Lambert seduced in the 1980s.[36]

Bob Lambert profile pictures

Photographs of Lambert have graced profile pages on several websites, from before his exposure until well after it.

The Guardian website, ‘Comment is Free’ section (2009-2011)

From April 2009 The Guardian newspaper ran articles by Lambert (and sometimes co-authored by Jonathan Githens-Mazer) in the ‘Comment is Free’ section. These continued until his exposure in October 2011, with the last article being published five days later.[37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47]

University of St Andrews profile (2011)

Photo for University of St Andrews staff profile page (at least as early as January 2014, and probably since 2012 or earlier).[48]Shortly before his exposure, Lambert was interviewed by New Humanist magazine, the journal of the Rationalist Association. The article was published just after the furore about his past erupted,[49] with an additional blog post by its author noting that “the revelations about his undercover work in the environmental movement raised questions about his work with Muslim groups after 2001, not least for the groups that actually worked in partnership with him”.[50]

London Metropolitan University profile (2014-2015)

Initially Lambert's profile page at the John Grieve Policing Centre - where he held a post as Senior Lecturer - did not have a picture. From mid-2014, however (that is, around two-and-a-half-years after his exposure) it boasted one of Lambert's friendly face, the distinguished and experienced academic. It lasted until the end of 2015, when Lambert quit his posts at both St. Andrews and London Metropolitan universities.[51]

Other Undercover Research resources

Notes

  1. The Evans/Lewis book states that Lambert first met ‘Charlotte’, AKA Jacqui, in 1983, “the first year of his deployment”. This is slightly contradicted by the account in The New Yorker piece, which is based upon interviews with Jacqui, in which it is said the two met “in early 1984”. In his 2013 interview with Andy Davies for Channel 4 News, Lambert himself implies that it could not have been 1983, with the words “I must say, in 1984 when I adopted that identity [Bob Robinson]…” In a 2014 article for an academic journal, Lambert himself strongly implies that his undercover tour began in June 1984 and ended in December 1988 (see Robert Lambert, ‘Researching counterterrorism: a personal perspective from a former undercover police officer’. Critical Studies on Terrorism Volume 7 Number 1, pp165-181 (2014)).
  2. 2.0 2.1 One Society Many Cultures, ‘One Society Many Cultures and Unite Against Fascism Convention’, One Society Many Cultures website, September 2011 (accessed via 10 October 2011 archive.org cache, 28 August 2014).
  3. 3.0 3.1 One Society Many Cultures, ‘Celebrate Diversity Convention unites communities to oppose racism, fascism and Islamophobia’, One Society Many Cultures website, October 2011 (accessed via 26 March 2012 archive.org cache, 28 August 2014).
  4. 4.0 4.1 Stopinfiltration@mail.com, The truth about Bob Lambert and his Special Branch role, Indymedia UK, 15 October 2011 (accessed 23 April 2014).
  5. London Greenpeace, ‘Undercover police agent publicly outed at conference’, IndyMedia UK, 40831 (accessed 8 November 2014).
  6. Rob Evans & Paul Lewis, Undercover: The True Story of Britain's Secret Police, Faber & Faber, 2013, p32.
  7. Rob Evans & Paul Lewis, ‘Progressive academic Bob Lambert is former police spy’, The Guardian, 40832 (accessed 8 November 2014).
  8. Rob Evans & Paul Lewis, ‘Undercover police: how 'romantic, attentive' impostor betrayed activist’, The Guardian, 40839 (accessed 8 November 2014).
  9. The poster in the background to this set of photos was for a 8 July 1933 dance put on by Richmond Labour Party and is currently at the International Institute of Social History.
  10. Rob Evans & Paul Lewis, ‘Undercover police had children with activists’, The Guardian, 20 January 2012 (accessed 8 November 2014).
  11. Rob Evans & Paul Lewis, ‘Undercover policemen, undercover lovers’, The Guardian, 22 June 2013 (accessed 8 November 2014).
  12. Paul Lewis, Rob Evans & Sorcha Pollak, ‘Trauma of spy's girlfriend: 'like being raped by the state'’, The Guardian, 24 June 2013 (accessed 8 November 2014).
  13. Rob Evans & Paul Lewis, ‘Undercover police spies unmasked - in pictures’, The Guardian, 24 June 2013 (accessed 8 November 2014).
  14. Note that one of the photographs was simply a less cropped version of one of those released in October 2011.
  15. Paul Lewis, ‘The Police's Dirty Secret’, Dispatches, Channel 4, 24 June 2013 (accessed 15 April 2014).
  16. BBC News, Ex-Met Police spy Bob Lambert 'should be sacked' as lecturer, in filmed item, 20 January 2015, (accessed November 2015)
  17. Undercover Research Group: location of this photograph as being at Glastonbury confirmed by private email, December 2016.
  18. Innovative Minds, ‘Islamic Human Rights Commission 2007: A Decade of Fighting Injustice’, Innovative Minds, November 2007 (accessed 3 February 2015).
  19. Stop The War, ‘Stop Islamophobia: Defend the Muslim Community’, Stop The War, June 2010 (accessed via Archive.org 18 February 2015).
  20. [Bristol] info@bristolstopwar, ‘Stop Islamophobia: Defend the Muslim Community’, Indymedia UK, 20 May 2010 (accessed 3 February 2015).
  21. Fourman Films, ‘Dr Robert Lambert Stop Islamophobia Defend the Muslim Community - 05.06.10 ’, 8 June 2010, n/a(accessed 3 February 2015).
  22. Raitt Orr & Associates Limited, ‘About Us’, Raitt Orr website, 2015 (accessed 4 May 2015).
  23. the tanjara,countering al-qaeda in london & debate on 'non-violent extremism', 1 October 21011, (accessed November 2011
  24. IISS IISS News, September 2011 (accessed November 2015
  25. Graham Smith, ‘Lecturer exposed as police spy-master who infiltrated Greenpeace and other protest groups’, Mail Online, 17 October 2011 (accessed 3 February 2015).
  26. Rob Evans & Paul Lewis, ‘Progressive academic Bob Lambert is former police spy’, The Guardian, 16 October 2011 (accessed 4 December 2014).
  27. Andy Davies, ‘Interview: Ex-Met's Bob Lambert on Stephen Lawrence smear’, Channel 4 News, Channel 4, 2 July 2013 (accessed 15 April 2014).
  28. Andy Davies, ‘I'm sorry, says ex-undercover police boss’, Channel 4 News, Channel 4, 5 July 2013 (accessed 15 April 2014).
  29. Whilst the interview was initially broadcast on 1 July, metadata associated with the still photograph indicates that it took place on 30 June.
  30. Robert Lambert, Bob Lambert replies to Spinwatch, Spinwatch, 23 October 2011 (accessed 16 April 2014).
  31. Robert Lambert, Rebuilding Trust and Credibility: A preliminary commentary reflecting my personal perspective, Centre for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence profile page (via Scribd), February 2012 (accessed 16 April 2014).
  32. Rob Evans, Paul Lewis, Richard Sprenger, Guy Grandjean & Mustafa Khalili, ‘Claims that police spy 'crossed the line' during animal rights firebombing campaign’, The Guardian, 13 June 2012 (accessed 3 February 2015).
  33. Kirsty Walker & Chris Greenwood, ‘Undercover policeman planted bomb in 1987 Debenhams blast that caused millions of pounds worth of damage to 'prove worth' to animal rights group he was infiltrating, claims Green Party MP’, Daily Mail, 13 June 2012 (accessed 3 February 2015).
  34. BBC News, ‘Undercover policeman 'fire-bombed shop,' MPs told’, BBC News, 13 June 2012 (accessed 3 February 2015).
  35. BBC News, ‘Green MP Caroline Lucas names undercover officer as shop fire bomber’, BBC News, 13 June 2012 (accessed 3 February 2015).
  36. Lauren Collins, ‘The Spy Who Loved Me: An undercover surveillance operation that went too far’, The New Yorker, August 25 2014 issue (accessed 30 September 2014).
  37. Robert Lambert & Jonathan Githens-Mazer, ‘The demonisation of British Islamism’, The Guardian, 1 April 2009 (accessed 22 November 2014).
  38. Jonathan Githens-Mazer & Robert Lambert, ‘Quilliam on Prevent: the wrong diagnosis’, The Guardian, 19 October 2009 (accessed 22 November 2014).
  39. Jonathan Githens-Mazer & Robert Lambert, ‘Reshaping Prevent’, The Guardian, 31 October 2009 (accessed 22 November 2014).
  40. Robert Lambert & Jonathan Githens-Mazer, ‘Let's be honest about Prevent’, The Guardian, 9 December 2009 (accessed 22 November 2014).
  41. Jonathan Githens-Mazer & Robert Lambert, ‘Muslims in the UK: beyond the hype’, The Guardian, 28 January 2010 (accessed 22 November 2014).
  42. Robert Lambert & Jonathan Githens-Mazer, ‘A hatred exposed’, The Guardian, 1 June 2010 (accessed 22 November 2014).
  43. Robert Lambert & Jonathan Githens-Mazer, ‘Prevent is dead. What next?’, The Guardian, 14 July 2010 (accessed 22 November 2014).
  44. Robert Lambert, ‘Sweden bomber's Luton link must not reinforce cliche’, The Guardian, 13 December 2010 (accessed 22 November 2014).
  45. Robert Lambert, ‘David Cameron's crackdown on extremism is counterproductive’, The Guardian, 8 February 2011 (accessed 22 November 2014).
  46. Robert Lambert, ‘What if Bin Laden had stood trial?’, The Guardian, 3 May 2011 (accessed 22 November 2014).
  47. Robert Lambert, ‘Police, counter-subversion and extremism’, The Guardian, 20 October 2011 (accessed 22 November 2014).
  48. Robert Lambert, Staff profile page, Handa Centre for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence, University of St. Andrews website, 2012 (accessed 19 April 2014).
  49. Paul Sims, ‘Crossing the line?’, New Humanist, 4 November 2011 (accessed 3 February 2015).
  50. Paul Sims, ‘Was the Met in bed with Islamists? My interview with Bob Lambert’, New Humanist, 4 November 2011 (accessed 3 February 2015).
  51. Robert Lambert (staff profile page), London Metropolitan University website, 2014 (accessed 19 April 2014).