After nearly three years on trial, student protestor Alfie Meadows has been acquitted of charges of violent disorder at London anti-fees protests in 2010. Meadows, who suffered serious injuries after he took part in the anti-cuts march on 9 December 2010, was arrested by police on suspicion of sparking violence.

After a lengthy court battle which saw Meadows face three separate trials, a jury at Woolwich Crown Court returned a unanimous verdict of “not guilty”. The judgement has come as a relief to campaigners who expressed outrage over the prolonged trial period and the accusations levelled against Meadows.

The 22-year-old stood trial alongside Zak King, another student, who was also acquitted of wrongdoing by the jury. The court case had been retried twice following inconclusive verdicts.

Meadows, a philosophy student at Middlesex university, needed emergency brain surgery after the protest, due to allegedly being hit over the head with a police baton. Both Meadows and King testified that they saw police officers using batons and shields to strike peaceful protestors.

The pair claimed police used force against students who were simply standing in the crowd, including some had fallen over and other who were directly facing the police lines. King said in his defence that “all we tried to do was defend ourselves and others and we have been dragged through the court system for over two years.”

Public figures had expressed outrage at delays which have prolonged the trials. After the first trial ended with an undecided jury and Meadows’s second trial collapsed earlier this year, a public letter demanding the immediate clearing of the two men of any wrongdoing was published in the Guardian. Signatories included the Cambridge University fellow Dr Anne Alexander, of the University’s Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities.

At the trial Zak King’s barrister, Tom Wainwright, criticised the use of section two of the Public Order Act to prosecute student protesters for violent disorder. Prosecutions under the law can carry maximum sentences of five years, and Wainwright commented that the act has been used excessively by the police as a “sledgehammer” against peaceful protesters.

Having been acquitted, Meadows has said he will now consider taking further action against the Metropolitan Police on account of the heavy injuries he received at the protests. His mother, Susan Matthews, told the press: “we can now move on to the really important thing, which is to get justice for Alfie." The police watchdog – the IPCC – had already began investigations into the incident following the 2010 protest but stopped on the request of Meadows’s legal team. 

On the jury’s verdict, Meadows commented: “it’s a vindication of my struggle for justice for the injury I received at the student protest. the verdict is not just for me but the wider struggle against police brutality.”