Filton judge issues new contempt proceedings against defence barrister

Jeremy Johnson is the security services-linked judge who sentenced four ‘Filton 25’ activists as terrorists for trying to prevent mass murder. He is also the judge who tried to convict Rajiv Menon KC, one of the defence lawyers, for contempt of court.

The appeal court had upheld Menon’s appeal, on procedural grounds, against the first charge Johnson brought, but also said Johnson could award himself the right to try again if he ticked the right boxes.

And he is trying again. He has even decided he can bring the case as ‘summary proceedings”, despite there being no urgency. The case will be heard at Woolwich Crown Court.

Alarming case details

The details of the charge speak volumes about the state of British justice under the Starmer regime. Johnson is attempting to punish Menon for informing the jury of the law, of their legal rights under it, and of some facts pertaining directly to the case.

The court document warns Menon that he will be arrested if he doesn’t turn up for the hearing, then lays out what he is meant to have done wrong:

you, in a speech to the jury in R v Head and others, contrary to those rulings:

1. Informed the jury of the principle of jury equity

2. Asked the jury to apply the principle of jury equity

3. Told the jury that the judge may not direct the jury to convict

4. Invited the jury to disregard the court’s directions that they should put views of the Middle East and the war in Gaza, and emotion, to one side

5. Suggested that the prosecution accepted evidence as to the history of the Middle East and the role of Elbit Systems in supplying weapons to Israel and that this evidence was critical to the jury reaching true verdicts

The final two accusations show Johnson’s offendedness that his rulings might be characterised as pre-determined, and that the Israeli arms company, whose equipment was damaged, might have undue access to power.

Informing juries of facts and law apparently threatened to “impede the administration of justice”:

6. Informed the jury that the court had ruled as a matter of law before hearing from the defendants that they did not have a lawful excuse for damaging property belonging to Elbit Systems

And you did so in deliberate breach of the court’s rulings knowing that would create a real risk of impeding the administration of justice, alternatively you did so deliberately in the knowledge of the court’s rulings.

And that you, in the same speech, suggested to the jury that the court was not impartial in that you:

7. Referred to the defendants being prevented from giving evidence about Elbit, later referring to Elbit being “protected” and “wined and dined in the corridors of power”

The reference was capable of creating the impression that the defendants have been treated unfairly and that Elbit has been improperly “protected” in these proceedings.

On no occasion does the summons suggest that anything Menon told the jury was inaccurate. For example, judges are not allowed to order a jury to deliver a guilty verdict. They can tell the jury what they think the verdict should be, but have no power to force it to obey.

Menon’s chambers, Garden Court, have issued a statement of strong support for their lawyer and condemned the:

attempt to criminalise a member of the Bar over the contents of a closing speech made in defence of their client…

They add that this criminal charge “has sent shock waves through the legal profession” and is damaging the reputation of the legal system.

Jury equity

The Starmer regime has already tried to prosecute a pensioner for holding a sign reminding jurors in a different case of ‘jury equity‘ – their right to acquit according to their conscience. The judge in that prosecution threw the case out on the sensible grounds that reminding someone of the law cannot possibly be perverting the course of justice.

But the regime’s problem has been that, when juries are allowed to know the facts and decide according to their consciences whether to imprison activists for trying to stop the slaughter of children, medics and journalists, they tend to acquit. So facts and law become ‘impediments’ to ‘justice’ – a concept now apparently not the same as the plain meaning of the word.

Johnson had also ordered that the jury must be kept ignorant of the fact that he was planning to apply terror sentencing to defendants charged only with criminal damage. Not even the media were allowed to so much as mention it – until the conviction was safely secured from jurors who thought only light sentences could be imposed, instead of years of prison and decades of limits on the activists’ freedoms. Law experts described it as a “grotesque abuse of power”.

Perhaps they are also in contempt of court, then…

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