PERVERSE OR NOT PERVERSE:THE DEBATE CONTINUES

Last week my post heading was "Perverse Verdicts".  This week the High Court came to a conclusion on what might be described as a corollary to that; namely that  "Mr Justice Saini refused the Solicitor General’s application for permission to bring proceedings for contempt against Ms Warner. Ms Warner had displayed a placard with the words “JURORS YOU HAVE AN ABSOLUTE RIGHT TO ACQUIT A DEFENDANT ACCORDING TO YOUR CONSCIENCE” to passers-by outside Inner London Crown Court on the morning a trial of a number of defendants associated with the environmental group Insulate Britain was due to begin.

Mr Justice Saini reached the firm conclusion that the Solicitor General’s case did not disclose a reasonable basis for committal, given Ms Warner merely “accurately informed potential prospective jurors about one of their legal powers”.  

To re-cap an interesting juxta position of the law; a barrister is forbidden to speak in favour of his client who wishes to put forward a perverse argument as his/her defence but an unrepresented defendant can him/herself argue that self same perverse argument. As I indicated last week this debate has a long way to run.  The full transcript of the above case HM SOLICITOR GENERAL Claimant - and - TRUDI ANN WARNER Defendant is available here.   

PERVERSE VERDICTS

It seems that especially since October 7th 2023 the term "public order" has been re-defined by police especially in London.  The Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police has taken a Humpty Dumpty attitude to expressions of public hate insofar as HD`s definition was that words mean what I want them to mean.  This approach to the policing of demonstrations large or small has infiltrated the minds of those mainly on the socialist so called "progressive" Left who are assembling at the drop of a hat to make felt their opinions on an ever increasing range of topics which they think that they and only they have the right to impose upon the public all manner of interference in their daily lives.  

Perhaps one of the first such demonstrations which was arguably aimed at government and not public opinion was that at Greenham Common between 1981 and 1992 when a group of women formed a 24 hours a day seven days a week permanent camp to protest at nuclear weapons being stored at the site in Berkshire on instant alert to be used by U.S. aircraft to bomb Russia if the "need" arose.  From tree huggers to road blockers via climate change fanatics, trans fascists and Black Lives Matter reparation seekers the elasticity  of the legal right to protest and the public`s right to go about its lawful business unimpaired has become increasingly stretched.  The bitter hatred of the politics being exposed by that massacre on October 7th has taken the antipathy to law and disorder a further anarchic step first posted here on 19th December 2023.    In simple terms in view of the protesters but a minefield for legal big wigs campaigns are being organised to allow jurors to disregard judges` directions that verdicts should be based purely on the evidence presented at trial and that the opinions or consciences of jurors should not override that prime consideration.  Events in Salisbury and Bristol appear to be following previous methods of protest. 

As a retired member of the lowest level of the judiciary I can, like everyone else, have an opinion and enjoy debate over a pint were I so inclined.  But for those at the top table this is a matter of fundamental constitutional importance.  With racists in the guise of "progressives" absorbing Islamo-Marxist inspired "anti Zionism" to avoid in their minds expressing hatred of Jews and justifying acquittal of criminal damage, breach of the peace and/or affray, BLM supporters defacing  statues and artworks and others similarly using climate change in their defence of public order charges the debate and conclusions on perverse verdicts has a long way to run.  

JURIES AND TELESCOPES

Today`s opinions for what they`re worth are from the viewpoint of an interested outsider and not as those of a retired magistrate.  An area where outsiders and the law interact without detriment to the former is in jury service.  Personally I have never served as a juror but for those who do especially in cases of acute public interest the pressures must be considerable  especially if their backgrounds are such where there has been no need to exercise higher intellectual functions.  In typical British fashion there has been virtually no research into how a jury functions.  All that academics can do is to analyse results and their aftermath. Such limitations were available for all to see in the cases of  PAUL YUSUFF,  MATTHEW YUSUFF  and  MOUSSA TRAORE. To quote from the matter heard on 27/3/2024 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE KING'S BENCH  DIVISION DIVISIONAL COURT and available here in full the jury spokesperson made a mistake on telling the court the jury`s verdicts.  The ramifications of this situation must be having or at least should have major second thinking at the MOJ as to how to prevent a further similar happening and that the "untouchable" workings of juries must be set aside in favour of properly funded academic research.  What immediately comes to my mind is that the jury`s findings should be written and signed by all jurors and handed to the judge before the pronouncement is made.  In the event of confusion that confusion could be rectified by the judge and clerk of the court before before any public "misspeaking". 

The other major legal event in recent weeks  was new guidelines from the Sentencing Council on Domestic Homicide Sentencing. For what it`s worth I do think said body is looking at the law through the wrong end of the telescope.  Thankfully the unlawful killing of another is still a relatively rare event in this country and domestic homicide whilst a dreadful crime with widespread ramifications for any family is also relatively low in the UK.  Perhaps Mr, Mrs and Miss Person in the street would rather that criminal activities on their doorsteps or high streets were in the sights of the Council in its efforts to use sentencing as a deterrent and punishment.  However with almost every day bringing news that more and more offenders who deserve immediate custody not being jailed owing to there being no prison accommodation and others being released with ever increasing remission I see no more prospect of that than I do of a much needed increase of police officers actually on our streets and new police stations being opened or re opened where they are actually needed i.e. on our high streets.  Meanwhile the Sentencing Guidelines despite denials look increasingly as if they are ripe for computerisation at least in the early stages of determining the seriousness of an offence but that is a topic for another day.   

SJP JUGGLERS DROP THE BALL OF JUSTICE

Sentencing of newsworthy serious criminals on live TV is no longer in itself a newsworthy event.  Pioneered in Scotland such opportunities  to show  the law in action are an indication of how the MOJ wants the public to perceive the state of justice perhaps to disguise the failure of the last 14 years during which from police to prisons and all posts in between only a rabid optimist would opine that  the public is well served against criminality. When multiple murderers are sentenced in effect to die in jail the tool makers in Petty France can almost be seen as clap happy with their mutual back slapping as national media take up the stories. However it`s at the local level whether on line or in print that tens of millions of people have their glimpses of the law in action. One would have thought that the recent furore initiated  belatedly  by the Magistrates Association in respect of the Single Justice Procedure would have invited criticism as to why it has taken nine years to reach the eyes and ears of the general public.  It has not.

Local print media, the vehicles which in times past by their reporting of local magistrates courts when indeed such were actually "local", were  once the "name `em and shame `em" engines of a type of neighbourhood watch all but absent now in our collective rush to the keyboard.  At one time the option for local newspaper proprietors would have been to try and increase circulation by offering content that social on line media and mass media print by their very structures could not.  However nowadays it seems the business plan for local press is to restrict their on line availability to subscription only.  By playing chicken with their readership as to who will give way first; those prepared to buy the hard copy, those who would pay subs or those who refuse either option, it`s increasingly unlikely that truly local news will be reported.  It is likely news agencies` synchronised   stories will become the mainstay for many.  And so the "news" of the Magistrates Association`s self critical and snivelling statement posted here last week has been widely repeated almost word for word up and down the country.  My point is why has it taken so long for this overdue criticism to reach the public.  A large cadre of defence lawyers must have been the first to be aware of the iniquities involved.  Their representatives within the Law Society would surely have been in the loop to lobby MOJ.  But most of all individual magistrates not worthy of their appointment have been complicit since 2015 in presiding over a court system that they must have been aware was acting contrary to their oath: "  I... swear that I will well and truly serve our Sovereign Lord King Charles the third, in the office of Justice of the Peace and I will do right to all manner of people after the laws and usages of the Realm without fear or favour, affection or ill will."

I have yet to see, hear or read of the contrition of any single or group of magistrates for their actions.  In my time on the bench we had an annual general bench meeting where any subject deemed suitable by the bench chairman and his/her committee could be discussed and voted on.  I understand that such process has been discontinued.  This is unsurprising since the take over by HMCS, the abolition of magistrates courts committees and subsequently the establishment of HMCTS, was to that end; the magistrates courts must be taken under complete government control.  So much for the joke concept of "local" when ascribed to justice. 

It`s apparent that unless magistrates form a new body to actually represent themselves as a professional association the operation of the lower courts system will increasingly be weighted to the needs of a government and less to the application of the law for local communities.  I always thought that magistrates being the only members of a branch of the judiciary not being financially beholden to government could and would use that independence for the public good.  On a personal level I resigned before my designated retirement date because I did not want to implement impending legislation.  I wonder how many sitting as Single Justices have had any doubt about their position?  They are as jugglers trying to keep five concepts airborne when they`ve trained for three.  There is the inevitability of public failure which should be accompanied by humiliation but rarely is.

 I do not expect this site will be flooded with comments.