Thread by @richimedhurst

LIVE THREAD: Julian Assange vs Govt of the United States

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

Live updates below:

Hearing is set to begin shortly, at 10:30am local time. Connected with other journos.

In January, while agreeing with the political charges, Judge Baraitser ruled against extraditing Assange on grounds that prison conditions in the US would be too oppressive, and that extradition posed a heightened risk of suicide. The US has sought to appeal this.

The grounds of appeal were determined at the hearing on August 11th. The US scored a victory as it was granted permission to appeal on Assange's health, namely c) and d). This is in addition to the other three. The grounds of appeal are as follows:

The United States is essentially saying that Assange is a malingerer, and in perfectly adequate health to be transferred to the United States to potentially face up to 175 years in jail.

In addition, the US is arguing that Prof. Kopelman, a renowned neuropsychiatrist, misled the court in his psychiatric evaluation of Assange, because in one of his reports he did not disclose relationship btw Assange and Stella Moris, and their two children.

Court begins.

#Assange is set to attend via video link. His lawyers inform the court that he's not well enough to attend in person.

.@wikileaks editor-in-chief @khrafnsson outside the High Court: "How can this be justice in any form when he is deprived of being present here today where his life is being decided?"

The prosecution maintains that even despite the diplomatic assurances from the US (no SAMs, jail in Australia) that the Judge erred in her judgement.

Julian's video link is no longer visible. We saw the blue room in Belmarsh for a few minutes, in which he appeared last time, but it appears that this is gone now. He did not appear, and it looks like he won't be attending court neither in person nor remotely due to his health.

Update:

https://twitter.com/richimedhurst/status/1453296590014255107?s=20

Lewis QC for the prosecution maintains that in light of the diplomatic assurance the United States government is providing, Baraitser should have sent case to Sec of State. They maintain that she should have afforded them the opportunity to submit these assurances.

(The thing is, the United States could have easily offered these assurances during the extradition hearing last year in Old Bailey, but didn't. We only heard of these assurances this year, in July, after the extradition hearing was over and judgement handed down).

Just caught a brief glimpse of #Assange. He was beamed in for a second from the blue room in Belmarsh prison.

Court confirms that Mr. Assange has joined. The brief moment we saw him, he was slightly out of frame. Assange is wearing a white shirt, a black (?) tie, with his right hand over his mouth and his eyes wincing. He is clearly unwell.

Lewis went through the assurances from the US govt, saying that they are "binding"; citing long history of cooperation between US/UK; that UK has never complained...

(Very debatable, since the US has certainly gone back on assurances to prisoners after extradition).

The prosecution brings up Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), which deals with inhuman and degrading treatment, saying that the extradition would not breach this.

Lewis says that the "defense' psychiatric evidence is predicated on the imposition of SAMs and detention in ADX Florence."

Lewis: "The simple solution is this: once SAMs and ADX Florence are removed, once there is an assurance of appropriate medical care, once it is clear he [Assange] will be repatriated to Australia to serve any sentence...

....then we can safely say, the district judge would not have decided the relevant question in the way that she did"

The US prosecution is arguing that if Assange is allowed to serve his sentence in Australia and not jailed in ADX Florence or placed under Special Administrative Measures (SAMs), then the judge wouldn't have ruled against extradition.

They maintain that the UK can trust diplomatic assurances from the United States, as they're an integral part of extraditions.

Lewis says there is insufficient evidence that the United States would breach its assurances. That this is factually incorrect.

Lewis addresses the argument from defense: that even if there are no SAMs, solitary would be just as bad/oppressive to Assange.

He refers to Kromberg, talking about pretrial detention in Virginia... that inmates in Administrative Segregation are not in solitary, that they are allowed to speak to each other through doors and cells, meet with lawyers, attend programs...

Lewis: There can be no argument that you're being held in solitary confinement if you've got a cell mate. You'll only go there for short stays.

Lewis: None of the examples provided show that the US breached diplomatic assurances to the United Kingdom.

The US prosecution is trying to paint a rosy picture to the judges; that Assange would not be housed in oppressive conditions, that there would be no solitary confinement, and he'd be given medical assistance....

The prosecution says the UK can trust the assurances given by the US to not place Assange under oppressive conditions, yet in the very assurances given there is a disclaimer (point e) saying that the US retains the right to do so

Lewis refers to argument from the defense, that assurances made to Abu Hamza by the US were breached. “This is not true, it’s wrong”.

Lewis reiterates what I just pointed out, saying the US must reserve the right to place Assange under oppressive SAMs, for purposes of "national security".

https://twitter.com/richimedhurst/status/1453315349110304770

Going back to Abu Hamza: the prosecution is essentially saying "The US didn't say it would never house Abu Hamza at ADX Florence, just that it might not. Therefore this wasn't a breach of assurances". Lol

Lewis now moves on to section 91 of the Extradition Act, which blocks extradition if oppressive to the prisoner's health, and whether Assange meets the criteria. This is point a) of the appeal.

Lewis insists court must consider Assange's current physical/mental state, not what it could be if extradited. He says Sec 91 of EA refers to prisoner's current state:"You have to take his mental health as it stands at the moment"

(Well, it's bad right now, acc to many doctors.)

Assange's partner @StellaMoris1 outside the court:

"What's at stake here isn't what is argued in court, today it's about whether the UK court are going to extradite a journalist to the country that conspired to assassinate him."

An eerie image: Assange is seen via video, sitting in a blue room in Belmarsh prison, looking pale and sick, as the prosecution can be heard in the background arguing to the court about his mental state, painting him as a malingerer. He is then escorted out the room by a guard.

Lewis maintains that the district court judge (Baraitser) applied too low a threshold re Assange's mental health. In some sort of twisted "benchmark", he cites example of other cases with "higher" suicide risk, so as to say that Assange was nowhere near this level of illness.

Insisting that the court must not look at how Assange's health could worsen in the future, Lewis says: One has to be careful of not going into this crystal ball type of approach.

Regarding Lauri Love, Lewis maintains that Love's case was different, as it was both mental and physical. Moreover, the Turner criteria was not referred to.

Lewis: Assange's current mental state is not such as to preclude extradition. He has no history of serious mental illness. The court did not rule that care from the US is insufficient for any future illness Assange might experience.

US prosecution lawyers argue re Assange: "No one, no one, ever extradited from the United Kingdom to America has ever committed suicide"

US prosecution calls Assange's risk of suicide a "trump card". Lewis: If he's clever enough, he can get around that [extradition]. It then becomes a trump card which cannot be dealt with by the re state, no matter if the prevention matters are 100 times better than in England."

US prosecution says the district judge's decision not to extradite Assange "carries with it the risk of rewarding fugitives for their flight."

Lewis: "It can then never be said that a person accused of crimes of Assange’s [calibre], can be put on trial, simply because he [the defendant] might commit suicide. Rather, reasonable care could be provided to him, regardless of the defendant’s determination...

...to commit suicide, he could still be put on trial. Nor would it prevent a court from remanding an individual in custody, or imposing a custodial sentence. In particular."

Lewis: "Turner test requires the court to find the mental condition as such that it removes the capacity to resist impulse to commit suicide. Out of the 5 psychiatrists in this case, only one of them says that, and it's Kopelman. (Deeley, Fazel, Blackwood etc) say it’s not there.

L: "It’s only Prof. Kopelman who says that in his report, none of the others. Out of the 5 professional psychiatrists, only one of them says he has Asperger's, which is Dr. Deeley. The other four says he doesn’t have Asperger's."

Lewis: "We say the district judge did not properly apply the test. She merely found. It’s the wrong approach, and does not sufficiently apply the Turner test."

Court is adjourned, will resume in one hour at 2pm London time.

Prosecution is misleading the court on medical issues. They claim that only 1 out of 5 doctors said Assange doesn't have capacity to resist impulse to commit suicide.

But this doesn't mean he's not suicidal. All doctors agreed he is at risk of suicide, just to varying degrees.

Lewis says the "Turner test requires the court to find the mental condition as such that it removes the capacity to resist impulse to commit suicide."-- and that's what happened. Prof. Kopelman did find that, hence why they're trying desperately to discredit his psych evaluation.

What the prosecution conveniently left out is that Kopelman is the doctor who spent the most time with Assange, lending more weight and credibility to his psychiatric evaluation than anyone else's. He saw Assange and diagnosed him with MDD, GAD, PTSD and traits of ASD.

The prosecution claim only one doctor found Assange to have Asperger's, which was Dr. Deeley,
However, in addition, Dr. Fazel and Kopelman both said that Assange has "autistic-like traits".

The importance of the Asperger's diagnosis, is that acc to the medical expert witnesses, in combination with MDD, it would increase the risk of suicide. However, even if Assange did not have Asperger's, which he does, he would still be at risk of suicide, which prosecution omits.

Court is back in session.

Regarding the point of why the United States didn't provide these assurances earlier, the prosecution is arguing that they may be offered at any point, including the appeals process.

The US prosecution is claiming there was no real risk that Assange would be placed under SAMs. Had Judge Baraitser notified them, they would have offered her assurances before.

John Shipton, Julian Assange's father, speaks outside the court:

The prosecution is trying to downplay the defense's fears that Assange would spend a lifetime in prison.

They refer to drone whistleblower Daniel Hale, “guilty of stealing information classified top secret, but in fact the court only imposed 45 months.”

“One has to be very careful at how these sentences are arrived at..... [....] The longest sentence ever was Reality Winner, they got 63 months."

Lewis says that Mr Kopelman's psych report was contingent on the self report on Mr #Assange.

One of the differences in K's appoach and that of Blackwood & Fazel, is they considered the day to day notes and observations made by the clinical staff and other staff of Belmarsh.

Which Lewis sayas did not support Kopelman's findings. He claims there's a very obvious need for caution and scrutiny when it comes to Mr. #Assange's own reports and health, and diagnoses based on that.

Lewis claims that because #Assange had every reason to exagerate his symptoms. Assange had asked to see his legal team before being assessed before at Belmarsh.

He was reading British Medical Journal. One can't necessarily read into that, but it is a factor.

Lewis says we must take into account the extraordinary lengths he went to avoid extradition to the United States. within a few days of losing his case at the supreme court he entered the Ecuadorian embassy and stayed there for 7 years, and only left when forced to by the Met."

Lewis says that during those years #Assange was very adept [inaudible] protection by Ecuador. He hosted a chat show on Russian TV @RT_com and assisted Edward Snowden on his flight to the US."

Prosecution says Kopelman was misleading to that position. That #Assange has a lack of any former psychiatric history; he was admitted to psych hospital during 20s, and no diagnosis of autism until he was in Belmarsh.

Lewis says he make those forensic points "because if there ever was a case which required for a dispassionate, objective searching, but above all an expert opinion, it's this one."

Lewis says that Kopelman based his opinions on those close to #Assange, e.g. his father. And that when Kopelman knew full well that Assange had in this years a relationship with Ms. Moris incl two young children with her, conceived in the embassy.

Lewis refers to #Assange giving an account of his treatment in the embassy, how dire it was that it was basically solitary confinement.

Lewis says it's a misleading statement because #Assange also says "the only thing stopping him from suicide, a small chance of success in this case and the obligation to his children."

#Assange is back attending the High Court. He can be seen again in the blue room at Belmarsh prison via video link. He has a mask on, his elbows on the table and one hand covering half his face. He looks very tired.

Lewis points now to Kopelman,

The prosecution are now going after Kopelman, for concealing the identity of Assange's partner Stella Moris in his psychiatric evaluation of #Assange.

Lewis says that Kopelman acknowledged his duty to the court and was aware of criminal procedure rule 19. He should have been aware that he could have made an application but did not do so.

Lewis says this was not an honest statement of truth from Kopelman and the judge erred in not taking this into account.

However, Baraitser did, and referred to Kopelman's decision to conceal the relationship as "an understandable human response to Ms. Morris’s predicament."

#Assange got up from his chair and walked somewhere inside the room. Not sure if he's left but he's out of frame.

The prosecution is referring to testimony from their medical expert Dr. Blackwood, who last year said that Assange is not at high risk of suicide; calling it "manageable" and that #Assange has the "capacity to resist".

https://twitter.com/richimedhurst/status/1309090995225665536

Lauri Love outside the court: "Julian Assange helped enable and facilitate the publication of journalistic evidence of war crimes by that same gov and regime that this court now considers that he should be rendered onto to undoubtedly be tortured and made an example of."

The prosecution are now attacking the medical evidence; going through various testimonies, both from medical expert witnesses that they and the defense called, to paint a picture that Assange is not at a high risk of suicide nor suffering from severe depression.

The prosecution point to Prof. Fazel's assessment that Assange is not at high risk, when compared to other prisoners.

Fazel: "When I refer to high risk, it's an elevated risk compared to prisoners of similar age & gender.

https://twitter.com/richimedhurst/status/1308758176054087681

Lewis wants to return to the cross examination of the medical expert witnesses. He is now talking about the cross examination of Prof Kopelman, last year in September.

https://twitter.com/richimedhurst/status/1308333209101295616

The US prosecution is basically doing what it did last year: trying to undermine the credibility of Assange's key medical expert, Prof Kopelman.

The irony here, which was pointed out at the time, is that Lewis had previously solicited Kopelman's services for another case.

Lewis is reading from the transcript, when Kopelman said he'd never worked in a prison clinic; or when asked about a code (ICD-10) from the intl classification of diseases, or DSM, Kopelman said he doesn't like "those bloody books"

https://twitter.com/richimedhurst/status/1308341850432995329

Something about milk and oranges again. The prosecution argue that because Assange consumed milk and oranges he does not have severe mental illness.

I mean .... wow.

https://twitter.com/richimedhurst/status/1308370671081263113

After chipping away at Kopelman's integrity and honesty, the prosecution are now going after his medical expertise. A repeat of last year in many ways.

Lewis is now putting into question the report by UN Special Rapporteur on Torture @NilsMelzer, which found that Julian Assange is being tortured in Belmarsh prison. He says that Kopelman cherry-picked parts of it, and that Milzer had criticized the UK's handling of case.

Lewis is now switching to the cross-examination of Dr. Deeley, reading bits from the transcript last year.

Lewis maintains Deeley is the only doctor who diagnosed Assange with autism, two others saying no autism, and two others indicating presence of autistic traits in Assange.

Team #Assange outside the High Court.

Lewis says that the attitude of Prof. Kopelman reinforces the requirement for a close analysis of why Baraitser said she preferred his evidence.

He insists there's a "real divergence" of psychiatric evidence.

The US prosecution says it wasn't sufficient for district court judge Baraitser to simply say she prefers one psychiatric evaluation (Kopelman's) over another "without giving cogent and detailed reason as to why."

The US prosecution is essentially saying that the judge gave too much weight to Kopelman's medical evidence and psych evaluation of Assange

Lewis: with such a divergence of opinions there had to be much more analysis than those remarks [from judge Baraitser]. The judge doesn't deal in any way with the weight which should be attached, or not attached, re Kopelman misleading the court.

Lewis says that in addition, the reason Baraitser gives to Kopelman not disclosing the relationship "as an understandable human response". "What does this mean?" asks Lewis. "An expert has a duty to the court."

Judge seeks clarification from the prosecution. Lewis says they did not seek to exclude Kopelman's report (on admissibility), but to dispute its weight.

Twitter is messing up my thread. The prosecution has just concluded, but bear with me I'm typing everything up below.

Prosuection says overall evaluation of the evidence goes to particular issues, like future risk of suicide. Lewis says "You can’t look into the future to predict suicide".

He says that Fazel's opinion about high risk of suicide means there's an elevated risk of suicide, in comparison to the other ordinary members of the prison population. It’s a comparative group.

Prof Fazel gives a clear position that you cannot judge suicide risk on a long term basis. We know that comparative rate in the US are better, a

Lewis says that Baraitser erred in her ruling because she posed the question of whether Assange’s intent to commit suicide comes from a psychiatric condition. "That is not a proper test." "It should be whether the individual is sufficiently mentally ill....

...that he has no ability to resist suicide, that is the correct formulation, not the one that she used."

Lewis says that in order to meet the criteria of Sec 91, Assange's mental condition must be such that it removes the capacity to resist the impulse to commit suicide. Acc to Fazel, Blackwood: that is not their position in this case. Therefore they say Baraitser was wrong on this.

The prosecution concludes: the appeal should be allowed because 1) the assurances exclude the factosr which the defense's case depend on, to demonstrate that there would be a future deterioration in assange’s mental health + risk of suicide.

"It’s plain that Kopelman’s evidence and judge’s findings were contingent on those factors."

2) Given these assurances, it cannot now be said that it's oppressive to extradite Assange. Judge would’ve decided the question differently under sec 91.

3) re the approach to Sec 91, the judge was wrong to approach the question on whether the Assange's mental condition as such it would be oppressive to extradite him, based on a prediction of the future and uncertain events.

Lewis maintains that it's the wrong approach to risk of suicide under 91, and had she applied this section correctly she would have decided the question differently and arrived at a different conclusion.

On point 4) the prosecution say the judge failed to take into account relevant facts of consideration to those future events. That there's a possibility Assange could maybe have the time he spent in English jail taken out his sentence in America, therefore serving less time.

Lewis says that this shows how intangible it is to try and grapple with potential future events. Kopelman's evidence was inadmissible and should have been given no or considerably less weight. He says it lacked expert evidence, failed to comply with standards, and lacked...

... statement of truth. He maintains when you don't see evidence as a whole, it's difficult to determine the overall reliability of opinions. That it's wrong for Baraitser to prefer Kopelman's evidence over Fazel and Blackwood.

Finally, Lewis maintains that as a whole, Baraitser should have weighed crucial factors, significantly differently. Therefore district court judge Baraitser was wrong in answering the question on Assange's capacity to resist suicide.

Over to the defense now.

Fitzgerald responds to the prosecution: “That’s absolute nonsense”. He continues: the conditions being referred to there are the psychiatric conditions not prison conditions.

Defense is going point by point now to respond to the prosecution. They will have more time to do so tomorrow.

Fitzgerald reiterates that Judge Baraitser listened to all the evidence and testimonies, she had all the evidence in front of her, and still arrived at the conclusion that Assange's is unwell and it would be oppressive to extradite Assange.

F: the district judge was perfectly correct in reaching those conclusions before. Views of Kopelman, Deeley, one has to recall that Fazel said he did NOT dispute the correctness of Kopelman's finding that depression was severe.

Fitzgerlad responds to the prosecution: this picture that my friend tries to paint, that Prof Kopelman was some "lone wolf" is absolute nonsense! Kopelman's [medical testimony] was supported by Dr. Deeley and in large part supported by Prof Fazel too

F: One of his [Lewis'] grounds is that: the judge didn't address the capacity to resist suicide. "Look at the heading!"

Fitzgerald makes the point that this isn't just about impulse. A person may make plans to take their own life, this is not impulsive, but nevertheless, they are driven to do this by their mental disorder.

Fitzgerald: Dr. Blackwood was the only person that said the depression wasn't severe in 2019.

F: Even if there are protective measures in the requesting state, will they be enough? Or will the person commit suicide no matter the steps taken? That is the test (!).

Fitzgerald to the prosecution: I wonder if you're reading the same judgement as we are.

F maintains that the judge did deal with the points raised, contrary to what the prosecution claims, and did explain why she prefers Kopelman's testimony.

The "protective measures" offered by the United States were already addressed by Judge Baraitser in her ruling. The idea that she ignored this is not true, as Fitzgerald quotes from the January ruling.

Court is done for today. I'll be live on TV and YouTube shortly to break down the #Assange High Court proceedings.

Thank you for supporting independent journalism.
►Subscribe: youtube.com/richardmedhurst
►Support: patreon.com/richardmedhurst
►Donate: paypal.me/papichulomin

Earlier today I attended Julian Assange's High Court hearing remotely.

I'm live right now on YouTube and Rokfin to break down what happened.

Rokfin: rokfin.com/stream/10360/B…

YouTube:

Correction: Julian #Assange’s request to attend the High Court hearing in person was in fact rejected. Incredible.

https://twitter.com/stellamoris1/status/1453452062163877892