The Just Stop Oil protester who invaded the World Snooker Championships has a ‘grift page’ boasting of highway obstruction, criminal damage, trespass and public nuisance in return for up to £50-a-month, MailOnline can reveal today.
Edred Whittingham, 25, who hurled orange paint on the green baize at The Crucible last night, may also be in hot water for apparently promising to carry out misdemeanours for cash, all in the name of climate change.
He remains in custody in Sheffield with comrade Margaret Reid, 52, after being arrested on suspicion of criminal damage.
Whittingham’s crowdfunding page begs for one-off donations, but also offers four levels of monthly subscriptions ranging from £5 per month to £50. The titles of these sponsorships appear to make clear that the cash will be used for potential crimes. Level 1 membership is called ‘Highway Obstruction’, Level 2 is ‘Aggravated Trespass’, Level 3 is ‘Criminal Damage’ and Level 4, the most expensive, is called ‘Public Nuisance Conspiracy’.
Solicitor Audrey Ludwig shared images of his so-called ‘grift page’ and said: ‘Is this of itself in breach of criminal law?’
Mary Aspinall-Miles, a leading barrister, replied: ‘I don’t think it’s advisable to say the least. Also and very technically looks a bit like you’re conspiring’ while one former lawyer said: ‘I would say it was. And everyone who contributes is likely committing an offence too’.
It came as the University of Exeter, where he is a third year, confirmed to MailOnline that he remains a student despite him being arrested six times in 2022 – and jailed once. There have been calls for Whittingham to be thrown out by the university, which is part bankrolled by fuel giant Shell.
Just Stop Oil protester Edred Whittingham, a 25-year-old Philosophy, Politics and Economics student at Exeter University, tossed orange powder over a snooker table during the World Championship before being dragged away
Whittingham’s website begs for one-off donations, but also offers four levels of monthly subscriptions ranging from £5 per month to £50 – with incendiary titles such as ‘Criminal Damage’ – to pay for his activism, phone bills, weekly groceries and for access to ‘exclusive posts’
Edred Whittingham, 25, and Margaret Reid, 52, are taken away from The Crucible yesterday as snooker fans stood outside and called them ‘f***ing idiots’ for disrupting the snooker World Championship
The eco-zealot was pictured handing out leaflets on the Exeter campus. The University has not thrown him out
An Exeter spokesman said: ‘We have seen the reports that an Exeter student was involved in the Just Stop Oil protest at the snooker World Championship. We understand the individual has been arrested and will not comment further during the police investigation’.
Whittingham is an undergraduate at the University of Exeter but also raises donations to pay for his protests as well as his food, drink and phone bill.
Urging people to donate, he begs online: ‘Help me stay afloat. My living costs are quite low, and any support you can offer means I can focus on my activism rather than needing to get a job in a pub.’
Supporters financing his activities may also have broken the law, senior lawyers have warned.
Another tweeted: ‘I think it is. A donor is sponsoring a crime, which might also be incitement’. Barrister Dennis Noel Kavanagh said: ‘Some very interesting Proceeds of Crime Act issues here’.
MailOnline has asked South Yorkshire Police, who arrested Whittingham yesterday, to comment.
The 25-year-old, a Philosophy, Politics and Economics student at Exeter University, was sent to prison for blockading the Kingsbury Oil Terminal in Warwickshire.
He also opposes having children ‘on moral grounds’ because he believes there is no ‘guarantee that there will be a habitable planet for them to grow up into’.
His comrade Margaret Reid, 52, a former museum professional from Kendal, Cumbria, failed to get on a snooker table because match referee Olivier Marteel, a Belgian nurse on unpaid leave, dragged her away.
Exeter University announced in November 2022 it had signed a five year contract to work with Shell on a “nature-based solutions project for carbon sequestration in Brazil and the UK” to help towards reaching Net Zero.
It has not been disclosed how much money the partnership will generate from the University.
But Emma de Sarum, Vice President Liberation and Equality at the Exeter Students’ Guild, condemned the move, saying: ‘Everyone knows fossil fuels are killing us, the only moral thing to do is disassociate from oil and gas companies.
‘It’s strategies like this where they try to greenwash over what’s really going on that makes me lose complete faith in the institution.’
Staff at PPE student Mr Whittingham’s halls of residence in the centre of Exeter this morning confirmed he wasn’t home and said they believed he was still in police custody in Yorkshire.
Meanwhile, other university students condemned the protest. Simon Hall said: ‘Ironically without oil he would just be squatting naked on a pool table’.
Archeology student Felix Allnutt, 21, said: ‘Protests like this make it appear, particularly to the older generation, that we are just spoiled petulant children.
‘I wouldn’t do something similar, it just seems like a guaranteed way to out yourself in prison.
‘I wonder whether PPE has become so radical because it’s been associated with Tory MPs they have swung too far the other way and turned it into an activism course.’
Sophie Breeds, 20, added: ‘It comes across more as a tantrum than a protest. I support Just Stop Oil’s message but people like this are going about things the wrong way.
‘Just Stop Oil are targeting the wrong areas, they should be going after corporations and MPs rather than sport and culture.’ Locals in Exeter were similarly unimpressed by the protest.
Michael Brigg said: ‘Oil has provided him with all the clothes he wears, if we didn`t use it we couldn`t grow food manufacture goods etc. ‘I suggest he re-educates himself on this and approaches it it a more thoughtful and considerate manner he will get nowhere doing this.
‘I do admit oil will run out someday, and we will have to adapt, over time but in a more orderly fashion. We can`t just stop using it straight away as he is suggesting it would create chaos.’
Snooker fans yelled verbal abuse at the two eco-morons as they were taken away by police from The Crucible in Sheffield last night. People who paid up to £325 per ticket to attend the event shouted ‘You f***ing idiots’, ‘What are you proving?’ and ‘Criminal damage’ at Whittingham and Reid as they were taken from the venue. The pair defiantly shouted back that the ‘climate crisis’ was more important than snooker.
Whittingham was one of 51 Just Stop Oil protesters jailed after they shut down the Kingsbury Oil Terminal in defiance of a High Court injunction last September. He asks his supporters to pay him up to £50 a month to fund his criminal protests.
Describing his time in HMP Birmingham as ‘perfectly tolerable’, he said afterwards that he ended up watching the Queen’s funeral because it was ‘something to do’. Whittingham was also arrested after he glued his hand to a painting at Manchester Art Gallery in July last year in another Just Stop Oil protest – one of six arrests in 12 months that he has bragged about.
Play was interrupted after the eco-zealot threw the dye on the table in front of horrified fans
Whittingham also targeted Manchester Art Gallery with Just Stop Oil in July last year
He was pictured later that day as he was carried away by police at Kingsbury Oil Terminal
The eco-zealot has also sensationally claimed he is opposed to having children ‘on moral grounds’ as he ‘can’t guarantee that there will be a habitable planet for them to grow up into’.
He told GB News: ‘I think it’s the moral choice, given the circumstances we are facing.’
He added that he thought it was morally wrong to have children ‘if we don’t sort out the climate crisis’.
The eco warrior, who is from Cambridge, has two brothers and a sister. One brother, Hannes, is a senior data scientist at AstraZeneca who gave five per cent of his salary last year to a climate fund against global warming.
His sister, Severn, counts a youth Extinction Rebellion group and a Marxist festival among her liked pages on Facebook.
Just Stop Oil said the disruption at The Crucible wasn’t aimed at snooker – the event was chosen so that ‘millions’ would see the protest, which led to boos and jeers from the crowd.
Play was immediately suspended at the event as cleaners brought vacuum cleaners into the arena. Master of ceremonies Rob Walker was among those who helped to sweep up the mess.
Snooker fans shouted at the male activist as he interrupted play, with one angry audience member yelling: ‘Get him off!’
South Yorkshire Police said last night that the pair had been arrested on suspicion of criminal damage and were in police custody.
Security officials dragged Whittingham from the table before police arrived to arrest him
Whittingham on GB News this year, insisting that having children was ‘morally wrong’ because of the climate crisis
Last September, Whittingham, above, was arrested for taking part in a Just Stop Oil blockade of the entrance to Kingsbury Oil Terminal near Birmingham, for which he was jailed
The force said in a statement: ‘Two people were detained after protestors gained entry to The Crucible. A 25-year-old man and a 52-year-old woman were arrested on suspicion of criminal damage. Both are in police custody.’
The affected table was due to be recovered overnight.
It is the second time in three days that a major international sporting event has been disrupted, after 118 people were arrested at Aintree in Liverpool on Saturday as they tried to scale the perimeter fence at the Grand National.
Former world snooker champion Stephen Hendry, on commentary duties for the BBC, said: ‘I have never seen that before at a snooker event. It’s a first.
‘It is scary. Wow! You just hope the cloth can be recovered from that. It caught us all by surprise and then this happens.
‘For me, straight away as a snooker player I am thinking, ‘Is the table recoverable?’ We don’t know what that is on the table.’
Whittingham’s fellow protester Reid said: ‘I did not take this action lightly, but I cannot remain a passive spectator while our government knowingly pushes us down a path to destruction.
‘They are giving handouts of £236million per week of our money to the most profitable industry on earth during a cost-of-living crisis. I can no longer justify watching from the sidelines.
‘I am angry and heartbroken that I have found myself in a position where taking this sort of disruptive action is the only way to get heard.’
Security guards rushed to the table and grabbed the eco-protester by his left arm before removing him from the table
Whittingham said: ‘I don’t want to be disrupting something that people enjoy, but we’re facing an extremely grave situation.
‘Europe is experiencing its worst drought in 500 years. We’re seeing mass crop failure right now. We’re facing mass starvation, billions of refugees and civilisational collapse if this continues.
‘We can’t continue to sit back and act as if everything’s OK.’
