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Tommy Robinson's Case Referred To The Attorney General.
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Will he now be allowed the freedom to speak openly in a higher court?
Will he now be allowed the freedom to speak openly in a higher court?
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According to the court transcript the newspaper breaches of the reporting order was a matter for the Attorney General. My case was not referred to the Attorney General for review and instead I was hauled into court immediately, refused my own choice of legal representation, prosecuted, and convicted in a matter of minutes in what the Court of Appeal regarded as a flawed trial. I was then imprisoned for over 2.5 months in solitary confinement until I won the appeal. I was held against my categorisation, moved to the highest Muslim population Cat C prison, subjected to mental torture and constant threats and abuse and had all of my rights removed in the interest of prison safety.
It is clear to me that my continued prosecution and heavy-handed tactics from the state is because of ‘who I am’ rather than ‘what I did’.
In relation to the second allegation, the strict liability allegation, I would like to say this.
It is only since my original trial that there has been an additional charge added suggesting that the contents of my livestream were prejudicial to this case. The case completed, the jury concluded, and the verdicts were given. I would like to state clearly that in the transcript from the original trial the judge discussed my video with Mr Wright QC, prosecution counsel. Having reviewed the content of my video Mr Wright stated in court: ‘There is nothing they could have seen that could in any way prejudice them against the defendants’. Judge Marson agreed on the record.
For this reason, (a) I cannot see why I should face two charges when the core of the allegation in front of Judge Marson was the breach of the section 4(2) order, other than because I am regarded as a political activist and the charges are motivated by my political activism, and (b) I do not accept that the material that was livestreamed created either a real or substantial risk of prejudice to the Leeds proceedings. The prosecution counsel and the Judge both agreed on the court transcript that my live stream could not have prejudiced the jury.
Everything I reported that morning was fair and accurate and published in good faith within the constraints of the judiciary’s guidelines for the media.
It is clear to me that my continued prosecution and heavy-handed tactics from the state is because of ‘who I am’ rather than ‘what I did’.
In relation to the second allegation, the strict liability allegation, I would like to say this.
It is only since my original trial that there has been an additional charge added suggesting that the contents of my livestream were prejudicial to this case. The case completed, the jury concluded, and the verdicts were given. I would like to state clearly that in the transcript from the original trial the judge discussed my video with Mr Wright QC, prosecution counsel. Having reviewed the content of my video Mr Wright stated in court: ‘There is nothing they could have seen that could in any way prejudice them against the defendants’. Judge Marson agreed on the record.
For this reason, (a) I cannot see why I should face two charges when the core of the allegation in front of Judge Marson was the breach of the section 4(2) order, other than because I am regarded as a political activist and the charges are motivated by my political activism, and (b) I do not accept that the material that was livestreamed created either a real or substantial risk of prejudice to the Leeds proceedings. The prosecution counsel and the Judge both agreed on the court transcript that my live stream could not have prejudiced the jury.
Everything I reported that morning was fair and accurate and published in good faith within the constraints of the judiciary’s guidelines for the media.
I will address each point in the allegations drafted by the Advocate to the Court.
The first allegation is that I suggested the defendants were involved in wider criminal activity. This is not correct. I was referring to two reports, one on the radio and one in the Huddersfield Examiner which set out the allegations relating to the 29 individuals. I cannot find the original references but a similar report on the BBC relating to the allegations is in the defence bundle.
The second allegation is that stating that those of the same ethnicity and religion as the defendants were disproportionally likely to commit the crimes for which the defendants were being tried could prejudice the trial.
This statement is factually correct. The Quilliam foundation who are a Muslim run anti extremism think tank have produced a research paper looking at convictions of this type 1 street grooming from 2005 – 2017. This is in the defence bundle. They found that 84% of all convictions were south Asian with the significant majority of those being Pakistani Muslim. All of these victims were white children.
Sajid Javid the Home Secretary himself announced on BBC news this year that in these types of street grooming trials the individuals convicted are from a disproportionately Pakistani background.
Nazir Afzal is the former head of the Crown Prosecution Service in the north west of England and a lead prosecutor on child sexual abuse and he also publicly stated on Channel 4 News that Asians and Pakistanis in particular are disproportionately involved in this type of street grooming. He also presented these facts in front of Parliament.
I merely stated factual insight into the ethnicity and religious make up of perpetrators of these types of crimes. I repeated publicly available research papers from the Quilliam Organisation, testimony from the former head of Crown Prosecution Service in the Northwest and a statement from the Home Secretary himself all three of which are in fact Pakistani Muslims themselves.
The first allegation is that I suggested the defendants were involved in wider criminal activity. This is not correct. I was referring to two reports, one on the radio and one in the Huddersfield Examiner which set out the allegations relating to the 29 individuals. I cannot find the original references but a similar report on the BBC relating to the allegations is in the defence bundle.
The second allegation is that stating that those of the same ethnicity and religion as the defendants were disproportionally likely to commit the crimes for which the defendants were being tried could prejudice the trial.
This statement is factually correct. The Quilliam foundation who are a Muslim run anti extremism think tank have produced a research paper looking at convictions of this type 1 street grooming from 2005 – 2017. This is in the defence bundle. They found that 84% of all convictions were south Asian with the significant majority of those being Pakistani Muslim. All of these victims were white children.
Sajid Javid the Home Secretary himself announced on BBC news this year that in these types of street grooming trials the individuals convicted are from a disproportionately Pakistani background.
Nazir Afzal is the former head of the Crown Prosecution Service in the north west of England and a lead prosecutor on child sexual abuse and he also publicly stated on Channel 4 News that Asians and Pakistanis in particular are disproportionately involved in this type of street grooming. He also presented these facts in front of Parliament.
I merely stated factual insight into the ethnicity and religious make up of perpetrators of these types of crimes. I repeated publicly available research papers from the Quilliam Organisation, testimony from the former head of Crown Prosecution Service in the Northwest and a statement from the Home Secretary himself all three of which are in fact Pakistani Muslims themselves.
I do not accept that reporting facts on the ethnicity or the make-up of particular offender groups could be categorised as contempt of court given the number of grooming gang trials currently in progress across the United Kingdom and the commentary on those facts which are widely discussed in the media.
The third allegation is that highlighting as significant the sexual references of the abuse that I had elicited from the defendants could prejudice the trial.
I asked each of the defendants what their views were on their verdict they were expecting to hear that day. All 3 of them separately made aggressive vulgar sexual references or sexual threats against both my mother and my wife. I did not ask the defendants to comment on their views of my wife and mother, they did this out of the blue. Repeating what they actually said in the video has no relevance or prejudice on the trial itself.
The fourth allegation is that I made derogatory comments about the ethnic or religious backgrounds of the defendants.
I would like to point out I was not talking about the specific defendants on trial I was referring to reaction I had received by family and friends of previous convicted grooming gangs. By derogatory comments it appears to mean telling the truth that under Islamic law, the “age of consent” coincides with puberty. In Islam there is no set age for marriage. The Islamic Prophet Muhammad, who is said to serve as a role model for every Muslim, is reported by Sunni Hadith sources to have married Aisha when she was six or seven years old, with the marriage consummated when she was nine years old and he was 56 years old. The prosecution may not like to hear the truth but there is no way that sharing the truth and facts about a particular religion on social media can lead to prejudice on a trial.
In relation to the fifth allegation, a number of the comments relied on were made by other people, and my comments related to grooming trials generally across the country rather than the particular case (e.g. the exchange at page 8 of the transcript of the livestream related to Rotherham, and Oxford). I made it clear throughout that the trial concerned allegations.
The third allegation is that highlighting as significant the sexual references of the abuse that I had elicited from the defendants could prejudice the trial.
I asked each of the defendants what their views were on their verdict they were expecting to hear that day. All 3 of them separately made aggressive vulgar sexual references or sexual threats against both my mother and my wife. I did not ask the defendants to comment on their views of my wife and mother, they did this out of the blue. Repeating what they actually said in the video has no relevance or prejudice on the trial itself.
The fourth allegation is that I made derogatory comments about the ethnic or religious backgrounds of the defendants.
I would like to point out I was not talking about the specific defendants on trial I was referring to reaction I had received by family and friends of previous convicted grooming gangs. By derogatory comments it appears to mean telling the truth that under Islamic law, the “age of consent” coincides with puberty. In Islam there is no set age for marriage. The Islamic Prophet Muhammad, who is said to serve as a role model for every Muslim, is reported by Sunni Hadith sources to have married Aisha when she was six or seven years old, with the marriage consummated when she was nine years old and he was 56 years old. The prosecution may not like to hear the truth but there is no way that sharing the truth and facts about a particular religion on social media can lead to prejudice on a trial.
In relation to the fifth allegation, a number of the comments relied on were made by other people, and my comments related to grooming trials generally across the country rather than the particular case (e.g. the exchange at page 8 of the transcript of the livestream related to Rotherham, and Oxford). I made it clear throughout that the trial concerned allegations.
The future safety of vulnerable children at risk is my concern here not the perceived prejudice towards the defendants because of their ethnicity or religion. If 29 white Christian priests were on trial on such charges with reporting restrictions, I would feel exactly the same.
When I initially went to report on the Canterbury trial I did so in what I felt was the public interest. The police had DNA evidence on all four of the now convicted child rapists, yet the decision was made to grant these individuals bail. They were still running the same take away shop and coming into contact with young school children. One of the defendants absconded to Afghanistan. With DNA evidence on each of the now convicted child rapists it was my belief that they should have been remanded to prison until trial in order to protect vulnerable children in the surrounding area. Instead the decision was made to release them back into the community on bail.
The same danger was placed on the children in case in question. The now convicted child gang rapists on trial in Leeds that day were also free to walk the streets on bail. There were 18 different witness statements detailing the rape and torture of those children and yet the justice system decided that they did not pose a risk to the public and granted them bail.
Just like the Canterbury case one of these child rapists in the Leeds trial on also absconded before his verdict was reached. I believe he has fled to Pakistan and according to the court transcripts he was last seen leaving his house with a large bag. That is a convicted child rapist free to roam the streets because he was deemed no risk to the public and granted bail.
I have previously been charged with a non-violent offence, and I was remanded straight to prison to await trial. At Leeds Crown Court in May this year, the police whisked me from the streets, I was subjected to a fundamentally flawed trial and then sent straight to prison inside 5 hours. This is all whilst the very same system allows alleged child rapists with multiple prosecution witness statements and DNA evidence implicating them in the crime to continue to walk the streets.
When I initially went to report on the Canterbury trial I did so in what I felt was the public interest. The police had DNA evidence on all four of the now convicted child rapists, yet the decision was made to grant these individuals bail. They were still running the same take away shop and coming into contact with young school children. One of the defendants absconded to Afghanistan. With DNA evidence on each of the now convicted child rapists it was my belief that they should have been remanded to prison until trial in order to protect vulnerable children in the surrounding area. Instead the decision was made to release them back into the community on bail.
The same danger was placed on the children in case in question. The now convicted child gang rapists on trial in Leeds that day were also free to walk the streets on bail. There were 18 different witness statements detailing the rape and torture of those children and yet the justice system decided that they did not pose a risk to the public and granted them bail.
Just like the Canterbury case one of these child rapists in the Leeds trial on also absconded before his verdict was reached. I believe he has fled to Pakistan and according to the court transcripts he was last seen leaving his house with a large bag. That is a convicted child rapist free to roam the streets because he was deemed no risk to the public and granted bail.
I have previously been charged with a non-violent offence, and I was remanded straight to prison to await trial. At Leeds Crown Court in May this year, the police whisked me from the streets, I was subjected to a fundamentally flawed trial and then sent straight to prison inside 5 hours. This is all whilst the very same system allows alleged child rapists with multiple prosecution witness statements and DNA evidence implicating them in the crime to continue to walk the streets.
The court has a duty to the victims and the public to protect them and telling them could help stop ongoing child sexual exploitation and maybe prevent future vulnerable children from falling victim to it.
Again I would like to reiterate that undermining the judge, the court, the proceedings, the supremacy of the law or the administration of justice was never my intention, but I truly believe the reporting restrictions on this trial and subsequent connected trials are detrimental to the public and should never have been imposed so the public could hear the details, and use the knowledge of the proceedings to help prevent further cases such as these coming before the courts.
The jurors are given a responsibility. They are aware of the consequences of researching the cases they sit on. It should be upon them and we should trust them to do the task with honesty and integrity; it should not be for the public to be kept purposely in the dark just in case they do not.
The end.
Again I would like to reiterate that undermining the judge, the court, the proceedings, the supremacy of the law or the administration of justice was never my intention, but I truly believe the reporting restrictions on this trial and subsequent connected trials are detrimental to the public and should never have been imposed so the public could hear the details, and use the knowledge of the proceedings to help prevent further cases such as these coming before the courts.
The jurors are given a responsibility. They are aware of the consequences of researching the cases they sit on. It should be upon them and we should trust them to do the task with honesty and integrity; it should not be for the public to be kept purposely in the dark just in case they do not.
The end.
The statement says,
" there is a practical guide aimed at judges and the media on the statutory and common law principles that should be applied with regards to reporting restrictions. The paper was called ‘Reporting Restrictions in the Criminal Courts April 2015 (Revised May 2016)’. In this paper it stated that Courts have no power under s.4(2) of the Contempt of Court Act 1981 to prevent publication of material that is already in the public domain (see page 27 of this document). "
However, what it actually says is,
"However, ordinarily fair, accurate and contemporaneous reports of legal proceedings held in public which are
published in good faith will not breach the strict liability rule – see s.4(1) of the Act."
There is plenty information in the public domain but is it all fair, accurate and contemporaneous reports of legal proceedings held in public?
" there is a practical guide aimed at judges and the media on the statutory and common law principles that should be applied with regards to reporting restrictions. The paper was called ‘Reporting Restrictions in the Criminal Courts April 2015 (Revised May 2016)’. In this paper it stated that Courts have no power under s.4(2) of the Contempt of Court Act 1981 to prevent publication of material that is already in the public domain (see page 27 of this document). "
However, what it actually says is,
"However, ordinarily fair, accurate and contemporaneous reports of legal proceedings held in public which are
published in good faith will not breach the strict liability rule – see s.4(1) of the Act."
There is plenty information in the public domain but is it all fair, accurate and contemporaneous reports of legal proceedings held in public?
I am not on Twitter but would be interested in reading what was said by Andrew Lawton, the Canadian, reporter regarding conversations he over heard from "reporters" from the MSM organisations. The web link I managed to get that does contain it is mysteriously "unavailable" due to "resource limit reached".(web attack to take it down?) It appears to be still up on Twitter but may not be pretty soon. He is being quoted as saying this however on "some" sites.
"Standing among the ordinary, decent people in the crowd as Tommy Robinson spoke I was struck by how completely at odds their behaviour was with the way they are portrayed in the media, especially at viciously partisan organs like the BBC and The Guardian, but even across much of the right-wing press.
These people are constantly being described as “fascist” or “far right” or “extremist”.
But I saw and heard no evidence of this whatsoever. They were vocal, yes, but peaceable and friendly. They were angry, yes, but it was controlled anger and intelligently directed. There was, for example, no hatred of Muslims — only of the creed that drives some of them to rape and murder.
How weird it is to think that we live in an age so blinkered that the man doing more than anybody to raise awareness of what’s going on receives more widespread censure from the Establishment than the actual monsters perpetrating these ugly deeds."
"Standing among the ordinary, decent people in the crowd as Tommy Robinson spoke I was struck by how completely at odds their behaviour was with the way they are portrayed in the media, especially at viciously partisan organs like the BBC and The Guardian, but even across much of the right-wing press.
These people are constantly being described as “fascist” or “far right” or “extremist”.
But I saw and heard no evidence of this whatsoever. They were vocal, yes, but peaceable and friendly. They were angry, yes, but it was controlled anger and intelligently directed. There was, for example, no hatred of Muslims — only of the creed that drives some of them to rape and murder.
How weird it is to think that we live in an age so blinkered that the man doing more than anybody to raise awareness of what’s going on receives more widespread censure from the Establishment than the actual monsters perpetrating these ugly deeds."
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