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Keith Mann is a British animal rights campaigner and writer, alleged by police in 2005 to be at the top of the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) movement.〔Laville, Sandra. ("ALF extremist stands by call to flames" ), ''The Guardian'', 25 June 2005.〕 He is the author of ''From Dusk 'til Dawn: An Insider's View of the Growth of the Animal Liberation Movement'' (2007). He has acted as a spokesman for the ALF, attracting the support of celebrities such as Carla Lane, Celia Hammond and Benjamin Zephaniah. In 2006, he was the subject of the Yousaf Ali Khan documentary ''Angels of Mercy?'' which aired on Channel 4.〔Khan, Yousaf Ali. ("Angels of Mercy?" ), Channel 4, 24 June 2006, accessed 29 October 2010.〕 In 1994, Mann came to widespread public attention when he was sentenced to 14 years' imprisonment as the result of a 1991 arrest for conspiracy to set meat lorries on fire. After an escape from custody, he was found by police working in an animal sanctuary run by the Celia Hammond Animal Trust, which had employed him unaware of who he was. Though his sentence was reduced to 11 years on appeal, it is one of the longest sentences handed down to an animal rights activist in Britain.〔 He told ''The Guardian'' in 2005 that the government in the UK had undermined the right to protest, which had driven activists to engage in tactics such as economic sabotage.〔 He has since turned his attention to mainstream politics, and stood unsuccessfully for parliament in the Oxford West and Abingdon constituency for the Animal Protection Party in the May 2010 general election.〔Ellery, Ben. (Animal rights election candidate served time for arson ), ''The Oxford Times'', 24 April 2010.〕 He said the point of fielding animal rights candidates was not so much to gain power, but to have a voice in the election process. ==Background== Mann was raised in Rochdale, Greater Manchester, by his father, who worked as a caretaker, and his mother, Doreen, whom he describes as having done "everything else."〔 His mother is supportive of his animal rights activism. She spoke to Ali Yousaf Khan in 2006 for a Channel 4 documentary on Mann: "To normal people, they're going to say he had no right to touch somebody's else property ... But frustration comes in here. He's petitioned, he has asked, he's demonstrated, he's done all sorts of things to ask these people not to do this ... If they were to speak to my son now, ask him what did he see behind these locked doors patrolled by guards and dogs, what did he see that would make him so angry, that he would have to go so far and destroy somebody's property."〔Doreen Mann interviewed in (Khan 2006 ), accessed 29 October 2010, from circa 8:15 mins.〕 His first job was on a dairy farm while on a youth training scheme at school. He writes in ''From Dusk 'Til Dawn'' that his lasting memory of the job is the cows crying out all day searching for the calves that had been removed from them.〔Mann 2007, p. 186.〕 He first came into contact with animal rights activists in 1982, when local hunt saboteurs were handing out leaflets in the street.〔 His first removal of an animal from captivity was when he took a rabbit from a hutch that he used to walk past every day, after having asked the owner for weeks to do something about the rabbit's situation. He writes that this incident changed his view of theft forever, and that he thereafter viewed himself as a "proud ALF activist." His next removal was of a tub of goldfish from a fairground, resulting in him having 53 goldfish in his bath for weeks until he found good ponds for them. These acts of "liberation," as Mann sees them, led to others to which he says he is unable to confess.〔 He has been arrested, charged, and convicted for things he writes that he did not do, and has gone without food in prison because he was unwilling to eat animal products. He has fallen off buildings and through a roof, swum through a river wearing wellington boots before jumping soaking wet on a bus and begging a free ride; has been shot at, spat on, driven at, and punched, chased by men with spades, and had elephant urine thrown over him by an angry clown. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア(Wikipedia)』 ■ウィキペディアで「Keith Mann」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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