The never-published High Court order Russell Brand won in 2015: a lifelong gag on his accuser, Sylvie Berki, that bars her even from speaking to the police.
We’d expect the judgment would contain the discussion of whether these restrictions were necessary and proportionate, and whether they were compatible with the exclusions in the Protection from Harassment Act. It does not. A lawyer would surely have raised these arguments, but Ms Berki of course had no lawyer.
Without going through the appeals with a fine toothed comb, I couldn’t say whether she raised these arguments along the way or if this is just an observation of the author. However she never really had an appeal, she was denied the chance to any full hearing at any stage over the last 12 years.
Somewhat, but it also seems Mr Justice Jay is just an asshole to litigants in person - in direct contradiction to the rules he was supposed to follow.
Mr Justice Jay does not have a good record of dealing with litigants-in-person. Two years later, in a different case, he behaved so poorly that the Court of Appeal and then the Supreme Court found that he’d bullied a litigant-in-person. The Supreme Court found that he had aimed a “barrage of hostility” at the litigant-in-person, and “harassed and intimidated him in ways which surely would never have occurred if the claimant had been represented”.
Without going through the appeals with a fine toothed comb, I couldn’t say whether she raised these arguments along the way or if this is just an observation of the author. However she never really had an appeal, she was denied the chance to any full hearing at any stage over the last 12 years.
Which puts meat on the adage that a person who represents themself has a fool for a client.
That adage assumes you are rich. A poor person who represents themselves is just poor and a victim of the system.
Increasingly so. Even the court-appointed solicitors are hugely overworked and underpaid, and often lose money on cases.
Somewhat, but it also seems Mr Justice Jay is just an asshole to litigants in person - in direct contradiction to the rules he was supposed to follow.
Hes a prize dickhead in general. Other judges mock him in their appeals judgements. Utter cock.