socialmedian: Q&A: Simon Mann's road to freedom

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Q&A: Simon Mann's road to freedom

Source: The Guardian

Nov 03, 2009

Summary

How the Old Etonian plotted a coup against Equatorial Guinea's president, was jailed and then won a pardon
Simon Mann goes free from Equatorial Guinea prison

How did Simon Mann end up in jail?

In March 2004, the former SAS officer led a group of 64 mainly South African mercenaries in an attempt to seize control of Equatorial Guinea by overthrowing its president, Teodoro Obiang Nguema M'basogo, and installing Severo Moto, an opposition leader living in exile in Madrid. If successful, Mann was to have received a $15m (£9m) reward plus lucrative security contracts. But the coup failed before it got off the ground when the plotters were arrested at Harare airport, in Zimbabwe.

Mann spent four years in Zimbabwe's notorious Chikurubi jail on remand on firearms and public order charges. Then he was moved across Africa to stand trial in Equatorial Guinea, where he was held at Black Beach prison in Malabo, the capital. In court last year, the Old Etonian confessed to a degree of involvement in the coup attempt but said he had been the "manager, not the architect" of the p

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