Fairford Trial - updates

south west | peace | news report Sunday November 04, 2007 19:04 by josh joshstyx at yahoo dot com

Hung Jury

apologies for the lack of posts during the week, had to be very careful during the actual trial not to publish anything that could be seen as potentially influencing the jury ?!?

24th January 2006
Trial verdict – Hung Jury

Here are the daily updates I wrote including the ones I couldn’t publish.



DAY ONE
Thankyou everybody for your very kind words of support. It is very heartening to hear that people support me in the action I attempted, especially as I am not looking forward to taking the stand and having the prosecutor (Mr Blair ?!) do his best to make me look pretty terrible. As I wrote to another friend, I just hope he doesn’t make me cry 

Thankyou also, v.v.much, for your kind help towards my appeal. I think I’m more than half way there already so massive cheers! to all, but still hoping it doesn’t come to that

First day started with the crown dropping the most serious charge of aggravated arson which had no upper limit on sentencing so was a big worry. Reasoning put to the judge was that their witness had retired from the USAAF and couldn’t be found.

This is v.good news as it looked like Crown were going to reintroduce the spurious peanut butter – slow fuse – IED allegation. Not counting my chickens just yet though, I think the Crown will still want to make other similarly spurious claims about my motivations for acting which I’ll have to qualify for the court.

I’m knackered, long day for all,



DAY TWO & THREE
Apologies for no update yesterday, all a bit heavy & I was knackered by the end of the night after sorting out papers for today.

Day 2 was a bit grim, but then the prosecution case is never much to look forward to. Basically, just went through a rather gloomy introspective note I wrote (never imagining it would be read by all the world and their mother) which sees me explaining why I was taking the action I was whilst questioning my own sanity for doing so at the same time.

The rest of the day entailed the original policeman re-reading my interview with him to the court, which took some time due to a propensity to waffle on my part.
Odd to hear the statement read by the original policeman, especially as it’s basically an hour or so account of the police getting more and more inventive with their accusations – ending with the comical peanut butter fused improvised explosive device. Although this was subsequently disproved by the MOD and the charges dropped, the prosecution seem quite happy to frequently mention it – just want to jump up and say ‘rubbish’ every two minutes.

Ended with a good opening statement by the defence though.

Day 3, today was probably tougher with me in the witness stand most of the day, being examined and then re-examined. Easy to forget what you ought to be saying and simply get overwhelmed by it all, truly terrifying.

Wonderful expert witness to finish today with, a Mr Godsell, retired RAF mechanic & pilot – many thanks.
No court Friday so tomorrow’s it for the weekend and back on Monday.
Unfortunately, looks as if we won’t be allowed our war crimes expert witnesses on DU & cluster bombs – will know for sure tomorrow.
All in all, lot better than it looked at beginning.



DAY FOUR
Day 4 was a bit slow and I think those who stayed throughout deserve an endurance award, plus my thanks of course.

Apart from a witness from the Glos. Weapons Inspectors, cheers Mr C, and a test of the effectiveness (or not) of my wire cutters, cheers Mr G, most of the day was taken up with the barristers and judge agreeing the ‘steps to verdict’ document. These are the instructions given to the jury which lay out all the defences and how they can or cannot apply them in order to reach their verdict.

Unfortunately, Judge has ruled I cannot have any expert witnesses regarding the war crimes I was acting to prevent. Not surprising, but still a big disappointment as it will probably have implications for the other two Fairford trials later this spring.

It seems that as the prosecution, quite deliberately, did not challenge that I ‘believed’ war crimes were going to be committed, therefore I cannot have any expert witnesses to back up the ‘reasonableness’ of my beliefs unless they can directly confirm the existence of my beliefs – all a load of legal rubbish really but just what the crown don’t want us to discuss.

On the plus side, the judge is still allowing me to run my war crimes defences. Plus I have some more every day defences to the specific indictments.
At the end of the day it will be down to the jury and how they perceive the conduct of the war – if they feel it was criminal, they can exercise this belief in making their decision.
Monday will be closing statements from all and Tuesday will hopefully be deliberations and jury verdict.
Still a lot to lose, but not so much as we feared at the beginning of the week.



DAY FIVE
As the trial crept into it’s 2nd week, I have become acutely aware of just how much support people have shown me and how important that has been – words cannot express how grateful I am for this, to everyone who has said or sent their kind words and particularly to those who have been able to come down and sit through all the protracted proceedings, in many cases day after day… truly humbling.

Today involved the closing arguments by both prosecution and defence, followed by the judge who still has a bit left for Tuesday morning. After the judge’s quick summing up tomorrow, the jury will then be sent off to deliberate. I’m not anticipating too much deliberating so would expect a verdict tomorrow as well.

Overall impression is that, if I were on the jury, I’d acquit me, but obviously I’m a bit biased. It is almost impossible to imagine which way the jury will go, what they will remember most from the proceedings, how they interpret things and what they will think is important. Thankfully, they also have the opportunity to consider how much they know and are concerned about our involvement in this war that should never have happened.

I did toss a coin at the end of the day and ‘heads’ won, so still a bit optimistic (?!)

As ever, preparing for the worst & hoping for the best,



DAY SIX
Day 6 today and no verdict as yet.
Judge finished his summing up just before midday and sent jury out for deliberations.
Jury deliberated, had lunch and continued deliberating this afternoon. They have been unable to reach a verdict they agree on unanimously and will deliberate further tomorrow.
Reassuring to know the jury are having a good think about it all.



DAY SEVEN
2nd Best of 4 possible outcomes !!
Absolutely outstanding !
My cheeks are aching from the broad grin plastered to my face !

Today saw the jury continuing their deliberations which began at mid day Tuesday. By 3‘ish this afternoon, they’d sent a note that they wouldn’t be able to come to a unanimous vote, 12-0, so were directed by the Judge to try and reach a majority vote, 10-2.

Less than an hour later the jury returned a note saying they would not be able to agree a majority verdict on either indictment, even with more time. The judge then, kindly, released the jury who had deliberated for almost 9 hours. Some considerable consideration of the defences seems to have been had, including the war crimes / lawful excuse arguments.

It is impossible to have an idea of how or why the jury came to their decision, except that, at least 3 didn’t want to convict.
This case could automatically go on to re-trial, but not till June at the earliest – after the two re-trials for M&P, T&P (I think).
Will hear if & when the Crown will re try the case in about 21 days.

I am enormously grateful for everyone’s support, it has made this last couple of weeks a lot less stressful than it could have been.

Going to sleep very well tonight.

Peace,
Josh