Overview

• Essex Police confirmed charges against Sarah White were withdrawn on the day her case was due at Chelmsford Magistrates’ Court.
• Police said White was arrested on suspicion of two Public Order Act offences and stressed the arrest was not for unfurling a Union flag.
• White had marched from the Bell Hotel on August 31 and unfurled a Union flag from Epping Forest District Council’s building before being detained.
• Protests at the Bell Hotel followed July allegations in which an asylum seeker housed there was charged over the sexual assault of a teenage girl.
• Epping Forest District Council’s application for a permanent injunction to stop asylum accommodation at the Bell Hotel is scheduled to be heard at the Royal Courts of Justice after an earlier temporary order was overturned on appeal.