Justice League Dangerous Pursuit

[Nella Mcnairy]

EvanSykes sped past a college, drove on the wrong side of the road in the path of oncoming cars, and went through a red traffic light as he tried to get away from police. But he ended up in a dead end street at which point he took to his heels - and then tried to claim some unknown person had been using his car. Swansea Crown Court heard the incident happened while the defendant's wife was away on a caravan holiday. Sending the father-of-two to prison, a judge told him his actions had put other road users at risk.

Harry Dickens, prosecuting, said just before 10.30am of June 14 this year police on patrol in the Caewern estate in Neath began following a Renault Clio car. The car drove to Twyn Teg where it pulled over and the police officer got out of his car to speak to the driver, Skyes. The court heard heard the Clio suddenly sped away and the officer returned to his car and began to follow it. Moments later the Clio turned sharply into a cul de sac and stopped again - a male passenger got out and ran off and then the Renault performed a three-point turn, narrowly avoiding the pursuing police car, and drove back down Twyn Teg and onto Dwr-y-Felin Road.

The court heard Sykes sped past Neath College - overtaking a number of cars and narrowly avoiding oncoming vehicles while forcing pedestrians crossing the street to quicken their pace - before turning left onto Neath Abbey Road and Cadoxton Road. He then drove the wrong way around a mini roundabout before taking the bridge to Neath town centre. The prosecutor said the defendant weaved in and out of the heavy traffic after the bridge and went through a red traffic light before turning right onto Bridge Street. At the far end of the dead end street he got out of his car and ran off. The court heard the pursuing officer was soon on the scene and saw Sykes had made his way down onto the railway track and was running along the line in the direction of Cadoxton. When the Clio was searched the officer found the key was still in the ignition, and saw a bank card in the name of Sykes. As the officer was attending to the Clio he was approached by two motorists who said the car had made contact with their vehicles as it sped along Bridge Street.

The prosecutor said the following day 24-year-old Sykes rang the police to report his car had been stolen. When he spoke to officers again two days later he maintained that version of events, saying his keys had been taken from an address at which several people had been present. The defendant was arrested on June 18.

Evan Michael Sykes, of The Crescent, Llanelwedd, Builth Wells, Powys had previously pleaded guilty to dangerous driving and to attempting to pervert the course of justice when he appeared in the dock for sentencing. He has nine previous convictions for 15 offences including driving with excess alcohol, using a vehicle in a dangerous condition, driving without insurance, and assaulting an emergency worker.

Jon Tarrant, for Sykes, said the Clio was registered to the defendant and, while there had been an attempt to shift the blame onto somebody else for the driving, it had been a short-lived one. He said the father-of-two had been a persistent offender between 2015 and 2018 but matters had been going well for Sykes and his partner over the last three-and-a-half years until family bereavement led to "ghosts in his psychology" re-emerging. The advocate said the "reckless offending" before the court had occurred while Skyes partner was away on a caravan holiday, a holiday the defendant had been unable to go on due to work.

Recorder David Harris said the defendant's driving had put other road users at risk, and he said Sykes had then tried to frustrate the police investigation into the incident with the "fiction" that his car had been stolen. With a one-quarter discount for his guilty pleas Sykes was sentenced to 10 months in prison comprising seven months for dangerous driving and three months for attempting to pervert the course of justice to run consecutively. The defendant was disqualified from driving for three years, with the ban extended by an extra five months to cover the length of time he will be behind bars. Sykes must pass an extended test before he can get a licence.

He told one biographer, "In the past it never occurred to me that every casual remark of mine would be snatched up and recorded. Otherwise I would have crept further into my shell." But Einstein recognized that his fame made it possible for him to serve as a powerful advocate for his deeply held political beliefs. A passionate humanitarian, he emerged from his shell to argue for the protection of human rights around the world.

Many of Einstein's political ideas seemed simple: prevent war through cooperation among nations, treat everyone equally. But he knew that "the problem is to get people to act" on these ideas. He supported the creation of a Jewish homeland in the Middle East but stressed the need for cooperation between Jews and Arabs. He worried that the United Nations did not have the authority to prevent war. He emphasized the need to safeguard civil rights and freedom of expression.

Einstein himself seemed to have little regard for national boundaries. His true allegiance was simply to the human race: "I am by heritage a Jew, by citizenship a Swiss, and by makeup a human being, and only a human being, without any special attachment to any state or national entity whatsoever."

Einstein considered himself a citizen of the world. He lived in several European countries before moving to the United States, and he also traveled extensively, visiting countries including Palestine, Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay. In 1922, Einstein and his wife Elsa boarded the S.S. Kitano Maru bound for Japan. The trip also took them to other ports including Singapore, Hong Kong, and Shanghai.

Einstein moved to the United States in 1933, after fleeing Nazi Germany. At the time he commented, "As long as I have any choice in the matter, I will live only in a country where civil liberty, tolerance, and equality of all citizens before the law are the rule." He became an American citizen seven years later.

The devastating world wars of the 20th century prompted leaders of many Western countries to agree to increased international cooperation as a way to prevent future hostilities. In 1919, right after World War I, the organization known as the League of Nations, was established. Throughout the 1920s, the League succeeded in settling minor disputes, but by the 1930s, it had lost much of its authority and it eventually dissolved.

The United Nations emerged in 1945 as a successor to the League of Nations. Today, the United Nations continues to promote international cooperation on such issues as global security, disarmament, human rights, and environmental protection.

Einstein supported a number of political causes that branded him a radical in the eyes of many in the U.S. government. He wrote of his support for socialism, for example, and described capitalism as "economic anarchy." Such statements, combined with his advocacy of nuclear disarmament and civil rights, made Einstein a highly controversial figure in the 1950s, when the House Committee on Un-American Activities and Senator Joseph McCarthy were accusing many of being Communists. Indeed, the Federal Bureau of Investigation amassed a file with almost 1,500 pages of information on Einstein's allegedly subversive political activities.

Although the United States and the Soviet Union were WWII allies against the Nazis, many in America were deeply suspicious of the Communist country. As the tensions of the Cold War deepened, fear of Communism reached its peak in the early 1950s. The U.S. Congress, led by Senator Joseph McCarthy and the House Committee on Un-American Activities, conducted witch-hunts in search of Communist sympathizers. The accused had two options. They could refuse to testify and risk losing their jobs and friends. Or they could cooperate and accuse friends and colleagues of being Communists. At the same time, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, led by J. Edgar Hoover, monitored citizens' activities, searching for "subversive" behavior.

Einstein and his leftist political convictions attracted the attention of the U.S. government as early as the 1930s. Denounced as a Communist spy and watched by the FBI, Einstein persisted in publicly criticizing McCarthyism as a dangerous threat to democracy and freedom of expression.

The case shocked the scientific community: J. Robert Oppenheimer was the most prominent scientist to become a victim of McCarthyism. Einstein, a vocal critic of McCarthyism, joined 25 other scientists in defending Oppenheimer. Oppenheimer's security clearance was never reinstated.

Long before the historic civil rights reforms of the 1950s and 1960s, activists like W. E. B. DuBois and Paul Robeson were pressing for improved conditions for African Americans. During the first half of the 20th century, civil rights groups argued for an end to segregation and worked to gain voting rights for all citizens. But progress was slow.

Einstein, who had experienced anti-Semitic discrimination in pre-World War II Germany, noticed with dismay the problem of American racism on one of his first trips to the United States. After he settled in Princeton in 1933, he worked with a number of leading civil rights activists and spoke out often against racial and ethnic discrimination. Although Einstein is not usually remembered for his commitment to civil rights, he was devoted to the cause, commenting that "in the last analysis, everyone is a human being."

Despite his ill health and a general dislike for giving commencement speeches, Einstein made an exception in May 1946. He spoke on the problem of racism during graduation ceremonies at Lincoln University, a historically black college in Pennsylvania.

When Einstein spoke of a Jewish homeland in the Middle East, he initially envisioned more of a spiritual and cultural center than a political state. One of the most important features of such a homeland, in Einstein's view, would be its excellent educational system. To this end, Einstein toured the United States in 1921 with Chaim Weizmann, then head of the World Zionist Organization and later the first president of Israel, to raise money for a new university in Jerusalem.

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