Bennett in Court

10.30 am in Britain is early evening over here.

I will check back later on to see if there is any news.

ok my friend.

Thanks to Bonny from JATYK
Resume of today’s Case Management hearing
sharonl Today at 7:26 pm

Tony has asked me to post this brief resume of today’s Case Management hearing.

QUOTE TONY:

The hearing was only ever about getting the matter ready for trial.

The hearing lasted around 1 hour and 50 minutes. The McCanns were represented by Jacob Dean (barrister), Adam Tudor, Isabel Hudson and two assistants.

Carter-Ruck had proposed a timetable for serving and filing evidence ahead of the trial and proposed that the trial would last for 1-2 days, to be held as soon as practicable on or after 10 April.

I made a number of applications at the hearing, which out of courtesy I notified to Carter-Ruck by hand on 2 February.

My application to have a ‘McKenzie friend’ [lay helper] with me at the hearing was granted by consent, and I thank my friend who acted as my McKenzie helper today.

I made an outline application to be allowed to apply for one part of the original undertaking I gave to be rescinded. This was granted. I have until 22 February to submit that application. That involves paying a Court fee of £80.00 and submitting detailed reasons for that application. At this point I will say that I do not propose to seek to rescind any of the following undertakings, all of which I have abided by except for the sale of one book to Mr Michael Gunnill (see below):

• To deliver up all hard copies of “What really happened to Madeleine McCann? 60 key reasons which suggest that she was not abducted” (known in short as ‘60 Reasons’) to Carter-Ruck
• To deliver up all hard copies of the leaflet entitled “What really happened to Madeleine McCann? 10 key reasons which suggest that she was not abducted
• To destroy any electronic version of ‘What really happened to Madeleine McCann? 60 key reasons which suggest that she was not abducted”.
• To destroy any electronic version of the leaflet entitled “What really happened to Madeleine McCann? 10 key reasons which suggest that she was not abducted
• To close our website, whose domain name was: www.madeleinefoundation.org‘
• To use my best endeavours to delete or otherwise prevent access to any and all defamatory allegations about the Claimants published by him on the website http://missingmadeleine.forumotion.net
• To use my best endeavours to delete or otherwise prevent access to any and all defamatory allegations about the Claimants published by him on the website http://democracyforum.co.uk
• To use my best endeavours to delete or otherwise prevent access to any and all defamatory allegations about the Claimants published by him on the website http://www.anorak.co.uk
• To use my best endeavours to delete or otherwise prevent access to any and all defamatory allegations about the Claimants published by him on the website www.truthformadeleine.com
• To pay £440.00 towards the Defendant’s costs [subsequently reduced to £400.00.]

I applied for an Order that ‘the Claimants [the McCanns] do specify which words they allege constitute alleged breaches of my undertaking’. This was because of what I claimed was a lack of clarity in the McCanns’ application. The Practice Rules are very specific in requiring that in a contempt of court allegation, the Claimants must be precise and full in explaining to the Defendant precisely why he is alleged to be in breach of an undertaking to such an extent that he deserves to be sent to prison.

I had also asked for more time to prepare my defence. The Judge was concerned about the volume of paperwork I was faced with [153 alleged breaches of the undertaking] and said that ‘there is considerable force in Mr Bennett’s request for more time to prepare his defence’.

This was resolved as follows. The Judge invited Jacob Dean [the McCanns’ barrister] to take a 5-minute adjournment to consider whether he wished to reduce his 153 alleged breaches to, say, ‘the 10 most serious breaches’. He said that if the McCanns could prove those breaches, it was unnecessary to prove the other 143. After 15 minutes, the McCanns’ legal team came back into Court and said that they would submit a new application based on ‘around 25’ of the most serious breaches. The trial will then be confined effectively to an examination of just those 25 alleged breaches. The Judge gave them until 4pm on Friday 17 February to serve this new application on me. He also suggested to Mr Dean that Carter-Ruck needed to be much more precise than they had been about the words I used that were said to be in breach of the undertaking and which term of any undertaking they were alleged to breach.

The Judge granted me until 9 March to reply to the McCanns’ revised application [the McCanns had originally asked for my response by 22 February.

The McCanns will then have the right to reply to my response. They will have to serve this on me by 5 April.

I applied for an Order that Michael Gunnill be produced as a witness and was able to inform the Judge in outline of how Mr Gunnill had obtained a ’60 Reasons’ book from me by entrapment, and how Mr Gunnill had boasted about doing this ‘on behalf of a third party’ which I believed to be the McCanns, via Carter-Ruck. I was granted permission to apply for a Witness Order against Mr Gunnill requiring to attend the trial and give evidence. I shall be doing that shortly.

I had applied for an Order that one of the McCanns make a Witness Statement to (a) state what evidence there is that Madeleine McCann was abducted and (b) to state what evidence there was, as claimed in Isabel Hudson’s Affidavit, that any of my actions had, as the McCanns claimed, ‘harmed the search for Madeleine’. These applications were refused. The Judge said that it was for the Claimants to give whatever evidence they felt was necessary to support their application to commit me to prison and that if I felt there was insufficient evidence that an abduction had occurred I would have the right to make submissions about this in my closing speech at the trial.

I applied for the McCanns to produce certified English translations of the two judgments against them in the Portuguese Court of Appeal (October 2010) and Portuguese Supreme Court (March 2011). The Judge refused, after asking the McCanns’ barrister if Dr Amaral’s book was now freely available in Portugal, to which of course he agreed. He said that if I considered these relevant, I should produce these myself. One of my supporters at the hearing kindly volunteered afterwards to see if she could obtain these for me.

The trial is scheduled for 2 days, any time on or after 17 April 2012.

In conclusion, I would like to thank each and every one of the eight people who kindly troubled to attend court to support me, and it was a pleasure to buy them all lunch at the Dulcis Cafe afterwards.

UNQUOTE TONY

hotrod says:
Justine Spencer
Tony Bennett made a complete fool of himself at the High Court today. His turn out of supporters amounted to a pathetic 5 largely uneducated and ungroomed carrier bag carrying OAP's who could not even restrain themselves during the 5 minute break from banging on about sedatives and various conspiracy theories which not only offended me immensely but showed total lack of respect for proceedings which is why I had to loudly tell them to shut up and save their ignorant gossip for the pub rather than in the High Court. The so called big guns failed to show yet are now apparently experts on what went down. From someone who was there it didnt go well for Bennett. He floundered as he attempted to represent himself, making wildly irrelevant points, muddying the waters, lacking clarity/focus and showed generally himself up to be a total fool who was way out of his depth. He cut a pathetic and a very lonely figure. He was denied an attempt to delay proceedings and made laughable promises that he had not recently made any libellous comments. He also admitted that he took all the into for his book from Amarals book. Isn't that plagerism? Amaral should probably sue Bennett for ripping off his book. To not put a finer point on it, Bennett was pi**ing in the wind. Body language of the judge clearly displayed that he was not impressed with Bennett. It's not looking good for Bennett.

Thank you Bonny / christabel for these updates.

So he tried to get one of the McCanns to make a witness statement. He cannot have been serious. The McCanns are not on trial, Bennett is, evidence on the abduction is available from various sources and a statement by the McCanns is not warranted. And the Judge quite correctly refused.

The judgements in the appeals of the Amaral libel case do not support Bennett. The appeals were not looking at any libel, they were looking at whether or not the original judge had overstepped her authority when she ordered the book withdrawn from market and the subsequent transfer of ownership. These judgements are totally irrelevant as they do not exonnerate Amaral from libel, nor do they rescind the need for a trial. This is seriously barking up the wrong tree.

Gunnill did not 'entrap' Bennett. And if Bennett is not careful he will get a new libel suit, as this is defamation. Gunnill was able to buy the book when it was supposed to be withdrawn from sale, and his reasons for doing so were his own. Bennett was freely selling the book, he was not coerced into selling the book against his will. I think that Bennett may not really understand what entrapment is.

This is not going to go well for Bennett.

And Hotrod's comments are very interesting. Thanks for posting them up.

I agree with you dianeh.

He has shot himself in the foot re Gunnill...as usual.

None of the usual after shock Photos have appeared yet !!!