Thread by @richimedhurst

LIVE THREAD: Julian Assange vs United States Govt

I am attending #Assange’s High Court hearing remotely and will have live updates below on the preliminary hearing. This hearing is taking place at the Royal Courts of Justice, London.

Live updates below:

The United States is seeking to appeal a UK Judge's decision in January not to extradite the Australian journalist & @wikileaks founder to the US. Having only been granted permission on 3/5 grounds, today the US will seek to be granted all 5 during this preliminary hearing.

Connected to the court with the other journalists right now. Preparations underway.

It appears that observers and human rights orgs are being let in such as @RSF_inter and @amnesty, as these were not permitted to enter during the extradition hearing at the Old Bailey and forced to enter through public gallery, with much difficulty and limited seats available.

(This is not just limited either to the Old Bailey, nor just to human rights orgs, as many journalists also experienced difficulties being let in on previous occasions.)

Today, @SMaurizi of @fattoquotidiano wasn't given remote access to this High Court hearing for some inexplicable, and very disappointing reason.

https://twitter.com/StefSimanowitz/status/1425350058468429824

MP and former Labour leader @jeremycorbyn speaks outside among the protestors:

Julian Assange's partner and mother of his two children Stella Moris @StellaMoris1 spoke a few minute ago outside the court:

As the court begins, Assange appears on the screen. He was expected to attend in person but is being beamed in via video. He is seen sitting, wearing a white shirt, a black mask and glasses.

The judges overseeing the case are Lord Justice Holyrode and Mrs Justice Farbey. Claire Dobbin is back again for the US prosecution, as is Edward Fitzgerald for the defense. They are all wearing wigs.

Claire Dobbin argues that Michael Kopelman's psychiatric evaluation relied heavily on the "self-reporting of Assange".

The court is currently dealing with point C, one of two grounds which the US was refused permission to appeal on. The prosecution is alleging that that Michael Kopelman allegedly misled Judge Baraitser on Assange's psychiatric illnesses.

Dobbin is going through Kopelman's psychiatric report on Assange, for which he interviewed Stella Moris. She alleges he failed to disclose she was Assange's partner. He did say in the report however that he had a partner and children.

This is was brought up during the extradition hearing during cross-examination.

https://twitter.com/richimedhurst/status/1308399095199997954

Difficult to hear and make out what they are saying, so bear with me.

Dobbin making similar arguments as we heard during prosecution, that Assange took asylum in Ecuadorian embassy, was running WikiLeaks and undertaking several activities despite the adverse health effects. Their logic is that he clearly wasn't unwell.

This argument by the prosecution that Assange was able to work and therefore wasn't depressed or unwell was disputed by several medical expert witnesses during the extradition hearing.

What they're trying to do is get the high court judges to agree that the psych report and evaluations by Kopelman, which Judge Baraitser cites in her ruling, somehow misled the court and that this affected her ruling not to extradite.

Just taking a moment to remind everyone why Jan's ruling wasn't satisfactory: the conversation now has shifted from putting press freedoms at risk to whether a witness allegedly misled the court & whether Assange is unwell- something corroborated by many, many medical experts.

Dobbin: "If an expert has misled the court, he has failed in his duty".

Dobbin refers to Blackwood and Fazel, two medical experts called by the prosecution, who during the extradition hearing downplayed Assange's depression and did not consider him to be on the autistic spectrum

https://twitter.com/richimedhurst/status/1309095025616318464

The prosecution is unhappy that Judge Baraitser relied on the defense's medical expert witness as opposed to theirs. They are insisting Judge Baraitser should have pressed Kopelman on why he was willing to mislead her.

Judge Baraitser in her January ruling wrote: "I preferred the expert opinions of Professor Kopelman and Dr. Deeley to those of Dr. Blackwood. Dr. Blackwood did not accept Professor Kopelman diagnosis of severe depressive episode with psychotic features...."

...(from 2019) and he did not consider that Mr. Assange met the diagnostic threshold for an autism spectrum disorder."

Dobbin saying that court didn't deal properly with Fazel's assessment of future risk, that you can't judge suicide risk.

Dobbin says district judge got it wrong, didn't seem to appreciate the width of evidence against Assange being in that condition

Fitzgerald rises for the defense.

We’ve set out our response to ground 3 and 4 in respect to notice of objection. What we say is that the single judge Mr. Justice Swift was correct to say that in relation to ground 3, there was no point of law such as the prosecution have sought to identify.

Can I just take you to page 158 where they set out their ground, that it should have been regarded as inadmissible, that the court ought to have ruled the evidence of Kopelman inadmissible.

As to the new ground about inadmissibility, Mr. justice swift made the point that that’s not how it was put. It was put that evidence prof Kopelman should be given little weight not inadmissibility

They rely on case of Kennedy, which deals with the question of whether person does not in their report comply with recognized duty to be independent and impartial

That was precisely the question which Baraitser posed. She is fully aware of the criticism and endorses it that there was a misleading statement. And heard an explanation that wasn’t challenged by prosecution.

In light of that explanation and evidence, the two reports and oral evidence heard, she concluded that he had not failed in his duty to report.

Can I just take the court to paragraph 329, she formulates an issue that at the end of the day he has given an unbiased opinion in his matter of expertise.

She asked: is this an unbiased opinion, and answers that question with full acceptance of criticism that can be made that he omitted nature of relationship info in first report

Can I just say that court has the structure of district judge’s reasoning: she poses the question is this an objective or unbiased opinion( Para 329.
And said she doesn’t find that he failed to give objective opinion.

She goes back to question at end of passage: was his opinion impartial?
At end of paragraph 331, page 110. In short I found Kopelman’s opinion to be impartial. I was give no reason to doubt evidence

She looks at overall pic of which the way the case was developed and concludes that he was an impartial and objective witness.

Fitzgerald: actually Assange disclosed the matter to the prosecution psychiatrist before the bail application, so prosecution knew about it then, and then again during bail application.

My lord my lady, there's no question of tactical advantage being gained by this. This is simply a matter of concern for the human predicament, which as Pierce explained in her later statement on pages 254. There have been a surveillance organization which was taking DNA from baby

nappy, saying special attention should be placed on Morris. Which were examining measures to either kidnap or poison Assange. There are very real fears and concerns, documented and heard by Baraitser

Fitzgerald: Prosecution is taking things out of context. And Judge was in best position to judge whether Kopelman was impartial or not.

Kopelman's disclosure in second report, was delayed as result of covid and by then Morris had already made relationship public. No intention to hide anything from court. Prosecution didn't seek to cross examine after disclosure.

Fitzgerald mentions fact intelligence tried to steal DNA from Assange's kids. He says district judge doesn't say there wasn't any surveillance, just that it wasn't proven yet.

If you look at what Baraitser found, she refers to the fact Kopelman's statements were misleading and takes that fully on board but then says : concealing the relationship was inappropriate, but understandable human response, a reasonable response to fears and concerns

And then Judge goes on to deal with the other allegations of impartiality. Nothing sinister in reference to argument. Nor did I find his inability to recall from diagnosis or ICD criteria to be strange, nor his summary of medical notes to be misleading,

My lord she indeed went through that, and Kopelman noted time and time again that Assange was not suicidal for a particular period, but then at a later period, did note this and that he was at danger.

So there was no question of selectivity. On the contrary, he set out all the medical records, one way or the other. And indeed that was one of the basics of Baraitser's finding, that Kopelman had been impartial

Regarding razor blade, it was suggested at one stage that this incident didn't happen. This blade was found however at one point ,with a disciplinary action. Baraitser did reach a conclusion that she was given no reason to doubt his impartiality.

Fitzgerald: Judge was primary decision maker, she saw all this info and we respectfully submit that no issue of law has arisen.

The case was fully adjourned from feb to sept, by then nature of relationship and kids had been fully explained to judge in march 2020, and Kopelman had made fun ref to relationship in report and evidence,

We submit that in light of this, judge was right to find that , although decision not to disclose the relationship was inappropriate, she did not find that she was mislead. We therefore do not find that this renders the evidence inadmissible.

The judge taking the evidence as a whole, both his reports into account, the oral evidence she heard, and the explanation given in early nov/dec was fully entitled to make the finding that she did, and made this given all considerations.

The ultimate question is: is the evidence Kopelman gave the course impartial? And judge says why she found his evidence to be soundly based.

So you have to take into context. What's the overriding duty? It's to be impartial and objective. Can this error in that moment and time, in that understandable human situation K found himself in: that as a matter of law, absolutely, his evidence is inadmissible, or

The answer we say as Justice Swift says is: obviously not. It's not that you make one lap and that your evidence should be inadmissible or given no weight. What we say is that: that is not an arguable point of law. The court should refuse leave on that given whole history

and given fact that prosecution did not challenge explanation given by judge, and we've set out the key points that would reasonably have led her to that conclusion at paragraph 7 that this was anticipating in a further report, not final report, that there was an explanation

that she accepted, that concerns raised with solicitors, it was a decision to defer, not to conceal. And it's a fact that the judge was never misled. The idea that K didn't refer to a lifelong partner and that this is inadmissible is laughable.

We do submit judge has evidence to all matters. We say enough is enough, it (argument of inadmissibility of evidence from prosecution) should be rejected by this court.

This is a specific complaint, that the evidence because of one lapse should be treated as inadmissible or no weight, and we say this is inarguable.

Fitzgerald: K does say in first report that he has relationship and kids, but this won't stop him from committing suicide. I accept, that it would be much better if there had been a fuller explanation, but a fuller explanation was given and was not challenged.

J: can you just direct me to the reference in the dec 2019 report to Mr. Assange having (inaudible) children

Fitzgerald showing references of kids to high court judges

Fitzgerald: Judge was primary decision maker as appointed by parliament. She scrupulously applied the test laid down, went through each of criteria.

Clear evidence of mental disorder. Kopelman find depression, Deeley found depression and Asperger's, and that it may be severe in Dec 2019. Even Dr. Blackwood accepted there was a depressive condition. No doubt a longstanding depressive condition, unchallenged by Fazel

Second question: was there a substantial risk of suicide. if you look at how judge approaches that question in grounds 4, they say she erred. She explains exactly why she preferred the evidence of Prof Kopelman and Dr Deeley in great detail at para 337, re to risk of suicide

Para 338: this is the view of Kopelman, considering risk of suicide very high

This is precisely because of his mental disorder, not because of a rational decision. Asperger's and depression confirmed by all experts.

Dr. Blackwood did not address his potential confinement in US and possiblity he could be held in isolation, and judge accepted this might increase the risk of suicide.

Dr. Deeley: the protective factors available here in UK not available in US (regular visits from partner, family, phone Samaritins, having contact with in-reach psychologist)

Judge sets out Fazel's evidence fully and says that the risk factors exist, and risks to be high but explains this and considers it dynamic and dependent on circumstances.

Fitzgerald continues: judge considered Assange faces the bleak prospect designed to isolate and clinical depression and thoughts of suicide, and therefore used Kopelman's assessment.

Rates of suicide in America lower, but rates of incarceration six times higher, so this is incomparable. So then to say that statistics can only take you so far, this is true. Look at time Lauri Love was refused, statistics were still low, but what about this individual?

She applied the exact test of Turner and found that the risk of suicide was high and voluntary, conditioned by his mental disorder.

Kopelman said the risk of attempted suicide would be high with Assange. Prof Fazel offered no opinion that (inaudible) would have the issue.
Dr. Blackwood did not consider this issue, but judge makes point that he didn't consider Assange's issue as serious as other psych did.

Baraitser in January: "For reasons already given, I have already rejected Dr. Blackwood’s more optimistic view of Mr. Assange’s mental health"

Fitzgerald continues: Baraitser prefers Kopelman's evidence, over the prosecutions witnesses, where is the point of law to say that this is wrong? And we agree with Justice Swift this is not an arguable point.

In light of that we respectfully submit that Judge Baraitser carefully applied the Turner criteria. We must remind ourself what ground 4 was: the judge erred in accepting Kopelman's evidence and Assange's risk of suicide. That's just saying reevaluate the decision maker's choice

... If one looks more carefully, the district judge correctly understood Dr. Deeley to be saying that extradition would worsen symptoms of depression and Aspergers less able to manage them, this would lead to the predicament where higher risk of suicide.

That's a clear indication that she accepted Deeley's assessment that high risk of suicide would be result of mental disorder and not by choice.

Baraitser in her January ruling: "As Professor Kopelman put it, Mr. Assange will not only find a way to suicide but it will be executed “with the single-minded determination of his ASD/Asperger’s”

Fitzgerald explains that this is what section 91 in EA is all about, to protect those at adverse health risk if extradited.

Fitzgerald: these points by prosecution are unarguable, and we've sought out to explain why judge was right to reach conclusions on both those issues, and single judge was right to say these points are unarguable.

We accept that statements, that K failed in his duty to disclose everything. To that extent there was a failure, he admits this himself in oral evidence. Again, I ask the court to take into conjunction with overall things given that this was a temp decision to defer disclosure

of this one point to later decision. We do not accept however, that one failure renders the evidence either inadmissible or no weight. What we say is that Baraitser was right to focus on criminal procedural rules, to give impartial evidence, but also asked: has he failed in his

overriding duty to be impartial? No he hasn't.

My lady it would be overly draconian to exclude valuable evidence to say that the moment you slip up the whole thing goes away.

It's effectively accepted by Kopelman that it would have been better to disclose relationship earlier. It cannot be rationally said that in consequence , his evidence is inadmissible or no weight.

High Court asks Dobbin for the US prosecution if she wishes to respond. She proceeds to do so

Dobbin: there is nothing in Kopelman's report that he failed to disclose something in initial report.

(inaudible, having trouble hearing her properly)

Dobbin is seated. Lord Justice Holyrode (JH): can we look ahead please to the appeal hearing... I can indicate to the parties what the two possibilities are.

There are 2 possible slots in October one is 19th and 20th of October

The other available slot is just over a week later on 27th and 28th October

Dobbin: I understand that lawyers in this matter have been in contact to ask for a 4 day slot. (They are discussing high court appeal date.)

Dobbin asks whether they will want to hear cross-appeal submissions

Fitzgerald: if the court has decided we can do it in 2 days, would be difficult. Is it possible to have both slots? We respectfully ask court to give us longest time possible.

F: the submissions of cross-appeal can't be made today as the person handling them is suffering from COVID atm, unfortunately.

Assange can be seen at the bottom of the screen, watching the proceedings. He is on via video link, seated in a room painted blue, with a plaque behind him that reads the name of the maximum security prison HMP Belmarsh-- also nicknamed "Britain's Guantanamo Bay"

Fitzgerald asks for a moment from Lord Justice Holyrode to check regarding the two dates. The court is in recess and will resume in an hour at 2pm BST. Court rises.

A prison guard appears behind Assange. We cannot hear what is behing said. Assange rises, takes some papers and his coat and leaves the room. Video links still on.

Apologies, as Twitter is breaking my thread. As I wrote here, the court is empty now, it will resume in an hour.

https://twitter.com/richimedhurst/status/1425425598210580481?s=20

Shout out to the great activists of #TeamAssange who are in front of the High Court protesting. Whistleblower and former UK Ambassador @CraigMurrayOrg, also the victim of a political witch-hunt, is also mentioned after he was jailed last week for alleged "jigsaw identification".

Just to recap while court is in recess. The US prosecution is challenging decision on January 4th not to extradite Assange to US. They have been granted permission by UK to appeal on 3/5 grounds. They are contesting the other 2 today in court.

The first is that a lead psychiatrist and expert witness Prof Kopelman mislead the court about certain details in his psych evaluation of Assange. The other is that the judge erred in her overall assessment of the evidence re risk of suicide.

The prosecution alleges that in his psych evaluation Kopelman relied heavily on "self-reporting" of Assange (every psychiatrist does), and did not disclose that Stella Moris, who is also in the report, was his partner and mother of kids.

They also argue that the judge disregarded the evidence brought forward by the two medical expert witnesses called by the prosecution (Fazel & Blackwood)

Defense points out that Kopelman did mention Assange had a life partner and kids, but he did not reveal identity because of spying, threats, and other fears and concerns that would have come about, prior to Assange and Moris disclosing relationship of their own accord.

Defense also argues that it would not be appropriate to completely throw out Kopelman's psych evaluation, based on a single lapse, seeing as how the judge considered it impartial and applied Turner test, concluding Assange would be at high risk of suicide not by choice...

...but as a consequence of his mental disorder and threat of extradition + US prison conditions.

The defense admits Kopelman disclosures would've been more appropriate, despite this, judge still agreed w/ his psychiatric evaluation & that of Dr. Deeley (another defense expert witness), and did not agree with the pscych evaluations of Blackwood & Fazel called by prosecution.

Court rises and is back in session. We could not see Assange so Lord JH checks to see if he can hear. We can now see Assange again. He is in a different room now, seated alone on a couch, blue walls, HMP plaque behind him.

Lord Justice Holyrode is going through case: listing charges against Assange, the 5 grounds of appeal and evidence weighed by district judge.

JH: District Judge Baraitser Rejected the majority of (inaudible) made on behalf of respondent, however his condition is such that it would be oppressive to extradite him to the US, ordering his discharge pursuant to section 91 2003 EA.

"The principle issue of the court today whether the applet can argue grounds 3 & 4 at hearing. The test to apply is whether both those grounds are reasonable to argue.

This court will not today make any final decision as to the success or failure of any ground of appeal has been granted or will be granted. That is a decision for the Constitution of the Court.

JH gives summary of case: in making her decision in relation to sec 91 of EA, the DJ considered a body of expert evidence called by each party, as to respondent's health and suicide risk. Of particular relevance, is her assessment of evidence provided by Prof Kopelman.

When K wrote in his report that Assange had relationship with Moris, while living in Ecuadorian embassy and that they were parents of two young children. In his report dated 17 Dec 2019, Prof Kopelman gives detailed account of respondent's personal and family history.

He gave a detailed account of the condition under which Assange had lived in embassy, who told him that after March 2018 he was effectively in solitary confinement for 60 hours a week.

He did not however name Ms Moris as Assange's current partner or ages of children or that they were conceived at embassy.

Lord Justice Holyrode quotes Judge Baraitser's ruling: "In my judgment Professor Kopelman’s decision to conceal their relationship was misleading and inappropriate in the context of his obligations to the court, but an understandable human response to @StellaMoris1' predicament."

#BREAKING: Lord Justice Holyrode rules in favor of United States, granting leave to appeal on grounds c and d, re psychiatric evidence.

#Assange High Court full appeal to be heard on October 27 and 28.

Give me a moment, I'm typing out his reasoning for this decision. I'll be live shortly on youtube.com/richardmedhurst

Lord Justice Holyrode: very grateful for all your submissions. He said this situation is very unusual for appeals court to question the evidence of an expert witness of a lower court. He goes on to say, however, that his is one of those times.

He said Prof Kopelman should have been aware of the Criminal Procedure rule 19.9 "when he chose instead to omit stating what he knew of the respondent's recent and current relationship of Ms Moris and children, when expressing opinion such as on solitary confinement"

According to judge, Kopelman essentially failed to make an application to omit this information, which was cited in his psychiatric evaluation of Assange.

Conclusion: this means in October the United States will be able to appeal on all five grounds, putting into question the key medical evidence on his psychiatric wellbeing and heightened risk of suicide if extradited to the US-- all on a technicality.

I'll be live on @RT_com to talk about this ruling on #Assange, and live later on YouTube.

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