Peter Margetts, Communication Director at Detained International. Peter is responsible for press relations and strategic communication with national & international governments, institutions, intra-governmental bodies and NGOs.
Peter is a businessman and entrepreneur. He holds a BA honours degree in Building Management and Technology and is fluent in Spanish and English. He spent 5 years living in Dubai and the Middle East. Peter was trapped by Dubai’s draconian laws on bank cheques, spending ten years imprisoned in Dubai, having been originally sentenced to 46 years for a bad check. A sentence Peter had reduced to 9 years with his relentless campaigning and a brutal hunger strike. Peter is a very determined individual.
A highly successful entrepreneur, Peter opened his property and investment firm Hampstead & Mayfair in Dubai in 2004, achieving a $100m turnover. The Dubai property crash in 2008 caused cheques written by the company to bounce, and he was given a life sentence for breaching Dubai’s horrendous laws concerning cheques. He spent many years in jail, and was finally released in 2019. His hunger strike brought global attention to the ridiculous cheque laws, unfortunately it led to Peter having a stroke in jail. He sets all this out in his fascinating prison memoirs ‘When’s Daddy Coming Home?’ (Conrad Press, 2020).
Detained International does not seek to be a huge organisation, supporting offices or employed experts across the globe. Instead, we act as a small hub of expertise on injustice and Human Rights violations from personal experience or direct involvement, working in partnership with the best local experts.
If you think you have skills that you feel we could benefit from, please contact us. careers@detained.org.uk