Contempt, Proceedings

Bianca Castro writes:

A silk accused of misleading the jury and ignoring the judge’s directions during his closing speech has been summoned to a hearing at which the court will decide whether his conduct amounted to contempt of court.

Rajiv Menon KC, called in 1993, faces allegations of contempt of court over his closing speech in a trial at Woolwich Crown Court. Menon represented one of six activists accused of breaking into the Elbit Systems Factory, near Bristol, causing an estimated £1m of damage. None of the defendants was convicted. Following a retrial, a jury found four of the defendants, including Menon’s client Charlotte Head, guilty of criminal damage.

Woolwich Crown Court decided of its own motion to proceed against Menon and referred the matter to a divisional court. The Court of Appeal found there was no jurisdiction for the Administrative Court to initiate contempt proceedings of its own motion and referred the case back to the Crown court. Last week, Mr Justice Johnson found Menon should face summary proceedings for contempt.

In a summons published today and circulated to the press, Mr Justice Nicklin orders Menon to attend the Royal Courts of Justice on 28 July for a hearing before Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb, sitting as judge of the Crown court at Woolwich.

The summons states that evidence ‘raises a prima facie case that the respondent may have acted in contempt of court and that it is in the public interest for contempt proceedings to be instituted by the court’.

Menon will be entitled to give evidence at the hearing, which has been listed with an initial time estimate of two days.

In his reasons, Mr Justice Nicklin acknowledged he was not determining if Menon had committed contempt but only ‘deciding whether there is sufficient material to justify the institution of contempt proceedings and whether it is in the public interest to do so’.

He added: ‘I am satisfied that there is sufficient material to justify the institution of contempt proceedings against Mr Menon KC in respect of parts of his closing address to the jury. That material is capable of supporting allegations that, in identified respects, the address departed from rulings made by the trial judge, or was in disobedience of them, in a manner arguably capable of interfering with, or creating a real risk of impeding, the due administration of justice.’

In considering the case, Nicklin said he bore ‘fully in mind the importance of fearless advocacy’ but ‘at the same time, it is fundamental to the rule of law that orders and rulings made by a judge in the course of a criminal trial are obeyed by those participating in the proceedings’.

He said: ‘If a ruling is said to be wrong in law, or otherwise open to challenge, the law provides means by which that may be corrected. It is not for those participating in the proceedings to decide with which rulings they will comply and which they will not.

‘Where there is sufficient material to support allegations that rulings and directions given by the trial judge were disobeyed in a manner capable of affecting the due administration of justice, I am satisfied it is in the public interest that contempt proceedings be instituted so that the matter can be adjudicated in accordance with law.’