Rajiv Menon KC won a reprieve on Tuesday after appeal judges stopped an unprecedented contempt of court case against him because the case had been put forward in a procedurally flawed way.
The leading barrister had been facing proceedings over his alleged conduct during the trial of six Palestine Action activists. His legal team called the ruling a victory, and the senior judges left open the possibility that the challenge could be revived under different rules.
The case had grown out of February's first trial, when Menon clashed with the trial judge amid allegations that he misled the jury. During the closing stages, Mr Justice Johnson issued detailed directions to barristers over what they could say in closing speeches, including an order that none of them could refer to jury equity. Menon's speech nonetheless drew jurors' attention to a famous 17th Century Old Bailey case that underlined the long-standing idea that juries can decide cases according to their convictions, independent of judges, and that judges cannot order them to convict.
That first jury did not convict any of the defendants. Last week, however, a retrial jury convicted four members of Palestine Action of criminal damage over their break-in to Elbit Systems, a British subsidiary of an Israeli defence firm. That development sharpened the stakes around the contempt case, which sat at the intersection of advocacy, courtroom rules and the limits of what a barrister can tell a jury.
The appeal court's decision does not end the dispute. It only pauses the immediate attempt to pursue Menon, and the judges' ruling leaves the door open for the matter to return in a different form. For Menon, the immediate result is relief; for the courts, the harder question is whether the same alleged conduct can be tested again without the procedural defect that stopped the case on Tuesday.
