(London, U.K.) On what is the United Nation’s Human Rights Day and the final day of the United States’ so-called Summit for Democracy, British judges overturned an earlier ruling preventing Julian Assange’s extradition to America on Friday (December 10).
Handing down the ruling at the Royal Courts of Justice on London’s Strand, Lord Justice Tomothy Holroyde quashed the order discharging the WikiLeaks founder and sent the case back to Westminster Magistrates’ Court — in the meantime directing Distrct Judge Vanessa Baraitser to decide the question of Assange’s mental health differently and to send the case to the Secretary of State, MP Priti Patel.
Lord Justice Holroyde and The Lord Chief Justice Ian Duncan Burnett, who was not present at the judgement for an undisclosed reason, came to the finding despite ultimately ruling against the United States with respect to the expert evidence of Professor Michael K. Kopelman, a world authority in neuropsychiatry and Emeritus Professor of Neuropsychiatry at King’s College London.
In the preliminary and substantive portions of the High Court appeal, prosecution lawyers on behalf of the United States sought to assert that District Judge Baraitser should have rendered his evidence inadmissible or given it far less weight given that he sought to shield the identity of Stella Moris as Assange’s partner and mother to two children together.
While the justices make clear that Professor Kopelman violated the Criminal Procedure Rules in providing misleading statements in his expert evidence and that they “cannot agree” with Baraitser’s finding that his conduct could be viewed as “an understandable human response” to spying within the Ecuadorean embassy, they ruled not to disturb her findings — following the well-respected principle that judges who have sight of all the evidence should be the primary decision-makers.
“The circumstances in which an appellate court will disturb evidential findings of a judge at first instance are well-known to be limited,” the justices said in their judgement.
“Unusual though the judge’s conclusion was regarding Professor Kopelman, we are unable to say that it was not one open to her having heard all the expert evidence in the context of much other evidence of Mr Assange’s mental condition, both from people who knew him and records.
“She was entitled to reach that conclusion, having heard all the evidence, having seen how Professor Kopelman responded to cross-examination and having explicitly recognised that aspects of his first report were misleading.”
While this finding nulified the U.S.’s appeal on grounds three and four, it was on grounds two and five in which The Lord Chief Justice and Lord Justice Holroyde were swayed and directed District Judge Baraitser to come to a different finding — namely the issue of diplomatic assurances provided from the United States to Great Britain via Diplomatic Note 74 of 5 February this year.
The court did not side with the arguments on behalf of Assange that the U.S. was trying to plug holes in its case after the District Judge had made her judgement or that the assurances were inherently unreliable, citing cases such as Haroon Aswat, David Mendoza and Abu Hamza which the justices rejected.
“We are satisfied that,” the judges wrote in their ruling, “if the assurances had been before the judge, she would have answered the relevant question differently.
“That being clear, we do not accept the submission on behalf of Mr Assange that the case should go back to the judge for her to decide the relevant question afresh.
“That conclusion is sufficient to determine this appeal in the USA’s favour.”
Shortly following the hearing, Birnberg Peirce Solicitors — instructed by Assange — issued a statement in which they indicated they would be appealing today’s decision to the Supreme Court, doing so within the 14-day deadline.
While not confirming whether Assange will also request a fresh High Court appeal on matters the lower court ruled against him, the option remained open after a passage in Friday’s ruling reaffirmed the earlier declaration that a cross-appeal remained on the table.
In their ruling, The Lord Chief Justice and Lord Justice Holroyde said: “We have heard argument on the USA appeal alone. We note that in Government of Turkey v. Tanis [2021] EWHC 1675 (Admin) Jeremy Johnson J indicated in an obiter dictum his provisional view that a respondent to an appeal could reargue all the grounds on which he lost to show that the overall outcome would have been the same, even if the appeal grounds succeed.
“We have heard no argument on this point. It may call for full argument in a suitable case.”
The case continues.
Read the judgement in full:
2021.12.10-USA-v-Assange-judgment101221