Fathers 4 Justice Buckingham Palace protest
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The Fathers 4 Justice Buckingham Palace protest was an incident that took place in London, England on September 13, 2004. At 14:20 BST, a group of protesters appeared outside the front gates of Buckingham Palace, and as the palace security was distracted, Jason Hatch and David Pyke, members of the fathers' rights group Fathers 4 Justice, ascended over the perimeter fence of the palace. Hatch, dressed as the internationally known superhero Batman, and Pyke as sidekick Robin, unfurled a ladder and began climbing up to a roof of an attached building. Hatch made it to the top, but Pyke came down under threat from armed police. Hatch moved along the ledge of the Queen's Residence until he was near the palace balcony, when he revealed a banner which said "Super Dads of Fathers 4 Justice". He remained on the ledge for five hours until police were able to convince him to come down in a "cherry-picker" crane. Hatch was arrested for suspicion of causing criminal damage; Pyke was charged with aiding and abetting a criminal act.
The incident marked the second time in 2004 that F4J had staged a major protest in Britain which made international news. On May 19, two members of the group threw condoms filled with purple flour at Prime Minister Tony Blair in the House of Commons during Prime Minister's Questions. The House was evacuated after that incident, for fear of possible biological contaminants. Matt O'Connor, the spokesman for the group, said the palace protest was to draw attention to the day's court appearance of one of the flour throwers.
Police initially thought the palace situation very serious, and were rumored to have considered at one point firing at Hatch. However, they supposedly discarded that idea after deducing that Hatch was no threat to the royal family (none of whom were in the palace at the time).
In addition to being the group's latest major publicity stunt, reflecting F4J's view that the UK Government hasn't yet done anything to deal with the issues that the group is concerned about, it also incidentally reflected the dismal state of security around the royal family and government institutions. On June 21, 2003, Prince William's 21st birthday party at Windsor Castle was gatecrashed by comedian Aaron Barschak, who was wearing a pink dress, and a beard and turban in a fashion similar to Osama bin Laden. Later, a tabloid reporter was able to get a job as a footman in Buckingham Palace, and would have been serving food to Queen Elizabeth II and U.S. President George W. Bush at a state dinner had he not been caught. Indeed, if Hatch and Pyke, two "ordinary guys" (Pyke's words), were able to bypass security so easily, the question became: what was preventing an armed criminal or a terrorist from entering a government building, and with Her Majesty and Tony Blair as possible terrorist targets, what was protecting them?
The palace breach was clearly a very troubling issue to law enforcement agencies and to lawmakers. Liberal Democratic chairman Mark Oaten called the incident "at best highly embarrassing, and at worst could have had terrible consequences". David Davis, shadow home secretary, described the multiple breaches of royal security as "scandalous incompetence".
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