Bias / prejudice / connivance / collusion / lack of impartiality

Bias has been raised by the media today in relation to Sir Peter Gibson heading up the Inquiry into complicity of MI5 and MI6 in torture at Guantanamo Bay. 'Reprieve' have rightly identified a reason why Sir Peter Gibson should step down from this Inquiry

"... In a letter to the judge, Clive Stafford Smith, a director of Reprieve, said there was a danger of bias that could wreck the inquiry.

He told the Mail: 'In an inquiry that is meant to assess the adequacy of past policies, Sir Peter Gibson should be a witness before it, rather than its judge.

'He needs to consider whether he can continue to act with the confidence of both the public, and the alleged victims of complicity in torture, with independence and impartiality.' ...

... Most serious is the suggestion that he has already conducted hearings in private, suggesting he has prejudged the issues.

... In his letter to Sir Peter, copied to the Prime Minister, Mr Stafford Smith wrote: 'You cannot now conduct a further independent inquiry having already reached conclusions on some or all of the issues.

'A fair-minded member of the public would see that as acting as a judge in an appeal against your own decision.' ..."

The Daily Mail 20/07/2010 by Tim Shipman entitled "Torture Inquiry Judge urged to quit over bias claims (Click Here)

However, of more concern to me is that the Inquiry itself is being conducted as a "mediation" which immediately signals that there is a cover up due to occur. What is also presumed is that the people engaged in the litigations are only after money as an outcome - this appears to be the dangled carrot to get the litigations out of the "public" domain of the court room. Some serious revelations of evidence of torture have already been sourced by the press into conduct which MI5 and MI6 are allegedly complicit in, such as slashing of genitals, but this information is in the public domain as a consequence of the court case and "Judges" doing their job properly, it would not be there as a consequence of a mediation unless the "PARTIES" agreed that it should be.

What Sir Peter Gibson's inquiry is doing is engaging in "hiding" the issues in the mediation and removing the case from the public domain of the courts. The parties will be required to sign a gagging confidentiality clause in order to get their money and how much will be confidential too.

Mediation may not be the appropriate methodology to do an Inquiry and as I have always argued mediation (alternative dispute resolution (ADR) / informal dispute settlement (IDS))is the real invasion in the United Kingdom which appears to have become embedded into even MI5 and MI6 rather than seeing it for what it really is: compromise. Mediation is seen as a win:win rather than litigation a win:lose. Why do MI5 and MI6 need to be seen to win : win - is mediation raising the spectre of a compromise - for a reason - if so, lets have the "reasoning" done in court. There is a raised presumption that something(s) need to be hidden or that MI5 and MI6 are blameworthy to some degree be it 99:1 or 70:30 or 50:50 or 40:60 or 20:80!!!!! Offering money is seen as preventing a "lose of face" ie "gold will be left on the table". If you compromise too much, then soon you will have no rights at all with carte blanche precedent to lower standards not raise them or adhere to them.

Jurisprudence is the science and theory of human law, ie why we have laws, why we obey them. Judges know why they reason which should not be escoteric. Jurisprudence is about safe and just society. Judges must reason. Therefore when a judge advocates mediation there is a need to question a judge's raison d'etre - essence of being. What is Sir Peter Gibson afraid of ? ... mediation was never about "costs" in court [Woolf reforms]. When a judge's efforts are more involved in not hearing the case or getting the case prepared for trial then something is clearly wrong with the judge and the procedural rules of court which is subjectivity not objectivity, ie bias, prejudice, collusion, connivance, lack of impartiality. The objective of a judge is to get the case to trial and to clamp down on parties who try to prevent it. When the judge is blocking or removing the case to ADR/IDS then something is clearly wrong with the judge and society ...

COMPLICITY

Complicity is in the media today. Sir Peter Gibson is to head up an Inquiry about detainees who claim they were tortured with the complicity of MI5 and MI6 whilst held at Guantanamo Bay in America in relation to the "war on terror".

Sir Peter Gibson is better known to me as Mr Justice Gibson of the Court of Appeal*. He heard or rather did not hear my case Lesley McDade v Masons sitting with Mr Justice Mance. Mr Justice Gibson gave 1/2 hour for my case before him, blocked an article 177 preliminary enquiry** to the European Court of Justice by using Martin v Glinware Distributors [1983] to which I argued the "loyalty clause", article 6 of the European Treaty of Union, which he called the Treaty of Rome. I left the court stating he was "despicable" and slammed my case files and slammed the door of the court room after me. I did not get done for contempt of court. Mr Justice Mance, however, said absolutely nothing for half an hour and handed me back his pencil marked up bundle.

Somehow, it missed them that I had experienced a perversion of the course of justice in both lower courts and it entirely missed them that Cathy James was "cause" and I was sacked because she had a loud voice and was absolutely incompetent leaving a confidential memo in the public network directory for which spurious allegations were made against me, the firm of Masons not liking the outcome of their disciplinary hearings. I was transferred and then sacked by Professor Richard Susskind OBE (Professor DisOBEdient) because I refused to transfer as I was not cause and it was an unlawful request as my contract did not permit a transfer, my having been suspended under the disciplinary clause not a variation clause. Once the suspension was lifted I wanted to return to post, not a transferred position when Ms James should have been held responsible and sacked. My colleague Catherine Johnson was also sacked, but Ms James was deemed "valuable" ... in what way I do wonder.

I did ask for the engineers taped transcript of the court of appeal hearing before Mr Justice Gibson which he agreed to let me have. Needless to say the recording equipment did not appear to capture pertinent parts of the transcript. The blanks did not appear to be in pattern suggesting faulty equipment leaving me wondering was someone playing with the recording button or drowning out using the air conditioning button. Recording equipment in court can pick up rather a lot, but some how my transcript was full of blanks, to include the Martin v Glinware Distributors blocking case precedent and arguments. There was definitely an effort being made to NOT hear my case.

My legal career was shattered by being sacked because of the spurious nature of the allegations against me which were designed to disrupt my legal exams being brought 40 days after the facts - so I engaged in a disciplinary hearings then an exam, appeal hearing then an exam, disciplinary hearing then an exam. Professor Susskind OBE deliberately sacked me in full knowledge I was not blameworthy and was malicious in his actions. He did not appear to like his being whipped in court by a legal secretary either hence the perversion of the course of justice and complicit practises I experienced on my journey to the House of Lords.

The tape transcript proved useful as I did manage to get to the House of Lords. My cheque for £500 for the Petition fee was cashed. The Bishop of Derby said Prayers. Then bizarrely the Bishop of Birmingham said prayers a few days later. Law Lords Hope of Craighead, Slynn of Hadley and Hobhouse of Woodborough refused to hear my case using blocking case law Lane v Esdaile, a 100 year old case, to deprive me of access to justice, something the Woolf Reforms and the Access to Justice Act 1999 said we had - NOT. They also failed to declare a lack of impartiality.

I was aware that Sir Peter Gibson worked with MI5 as I googled their website and put his name in the search engine and it came up. It was just an off the cuff thing but I was looking for a reason as to why I was being treated so shabbily by the court. Sir Peter Gibson is Commissioner for the intelligence services ... but he does not come across as competent nor intelligent and I was by now a paralegal, else he was protecting someone possibly Susskind, Molyneux or Ford: you just could not be that dim concerning the case papers in my case.

I am therefore somewhat surprised that Sir Peter Gibson is heading up this Inquiry and wonder why MI5/MI6 are effectively policing themselves ... perhaps the detainees would be better sticking with their court cases. Ye of little faith ... *the case papers of the court of appeal are published in earlier posts on this blog

** An article 177 preliminary enquiry (now known as article 234) is "discretionary" at the Court of Appeal and "automatic" at the House of Lords. (I also had an article 177 preliminary reference in the House of Lords case papers)

E M P A T H Y

The Government are listening - they want joe public's ideas on law that govern's us and have set up three headings (a) civil liberties; (b) repeal; (c) redtape, go to :

www.yourfreedom.hmg.gov.uk

I have managed to log 3 ideas so far, but the server is currently down for a hardware upgrade this evening - I will add some more later if I can.

The idea is that all ideas will be looked at and some will be acted upon. The "listening" will complete some time in the Autumn.

Have fun. Go for it. Try.