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IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEENS BENCH DIVISION
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CASE NO: HQ05X00419
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In the matter of the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 and:
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BETWEEN
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(1) SARAH BRANSON
(2) GERAINT DAVIES
and
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Claimants
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Thomas Moore
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Defendant
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(The Claimants and Defendant in an intended action)
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FIRST WITNESS STATEMENT OF THE SARAH BRANSON, FIRST CLAIMANT
- I am a Barrister at Law and tenant at Coram Chambers, 4 Brick Court, Temple, London, EC4Y 9AD. I make this statement in support of my application for interim injunctive relief against the Respondent under CPR 23 & 25 and the Protection from Harassment Act 1997. These proceedings have not yet been issued and the application is made without notice because in the circumstances set out in this statement I believe that it is likely that were the Respondent to become aware of the existence of proceedings or the present application I would be subject to further conduct amounting to harassment of the type which I seek to restrain.
- Prior to being called to the Bar, I worked as a caseworker for the Second Applicant, who is Hie Member of Parliament for Croydon Central. In this role, I assisted the Second Applicant with requests for help from constituents and kept the diary for his surgery appointments
- In January 1999, Mr Davies was contacted by the Respondent. Thomas Moore, about a housing problem.
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Was the problem the block of my access to services, especially legal services?
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Solicitors Daniel Curry on 12 February 1999 (above) do not even explain the one month delay, let alone whatever "satisfactorily" is supposed to mean.
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As I recall, the Respondent was being evicted by his housing association for harassing other tenants and his landlord had obtained an injunction. Enquiries were made on his behalf and it transpired that he was being offered support by social services but had failed to attend a number of appointments offered to him. We
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therefore arranged a further appointment for him with social services who had informed us that Mr Moore had mental health problems. Mr Moore had requested a surgery appointment and we were advised by Croydon Social Services not to meet Mr Moore without them being present, and that he might constitute a safety risk. I attach at EH0 a print out of the casework sheet from that time.
EH0
- As a result of the information obtained from social services Mr Davies arranged for a plain clothes policemen to attend and wait outside, to be on-hand should any difficulties arise. There is an email confirming this arrangement which for reasons which I shall explain, can now be found reproduced on a website belonging to the Respondent (EH 1).
EH1
- Mr Davies suggested that I did not assist him at the surgery on this occasion, as he was concerned about my personal safety. No other constituents had requested a surgery appointment that day. I have therefore never met the Respondent or spoken to him.
- I was informed by Mr Davies that when the Respondent attended the surgery appointment, he became very angry and shouted at Mr Davies because a social worker was present. He also snatched Mr Daves' file containing information about the surgery.
Or, to put it another way, "it was very nice to meet you again."
- Was a Police Officer present (paragraph 4)?
- Or was Mr Geraint Davies files snatched (paragraph 6)?
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"We, however, had no more dealings with him . . .."
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- After this surgery appointment, I was contacted by a police officer who informed me that Mr Moore had set up a website entitled "British Deviants" and had listed Mr Davies' name and address on it. Croydon Social Services informed us they intended to have Him arrested for harassment in order to conduct a full assessment of him under the Mental Health Act. We, however, had no more dealings with him and I do not know if Social Services in fact took any action.
- Last year, I was notified by a solicitor who instructs me that he had discovered a website containing what he considered to be defamatory information about me. He found this when doing a Google search to find my chambers' profile. This website was at www.tom-moore.co.uk. I was alarmed when I looked at the content of the website as it alleged, among other things, that I was having an affair with Geraint Davies and was a liar. I found this upsetting, and contacted Google to see if they could remove it from their search engine. They replied that there was nothing that they could do.
- I discovered in late November 2004, with some technical assistance from another member of my chambers, that the domain name www.sarahbranson.com was linked to the Respondent's site so that clicking on this address, ostensibly my own website, brings
and www.4brick.co.uk is ostensibly who's web site?
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Barrister Sarah Branson works from Coram Chambers
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up pages from the Respondent's site when refer to me; indeed when the page loads it begins with a recording of my voice leaving a telephone message for the Respondent. I have since been contacted by a number of people who have found this site. I exhibit copies of pages from the Respondent's website at EH1. I believe in the circumstances that the Respondent has registered the domain name www.sarahbranson.com for the purpose of intercepting and diverting internet searches against my name to his own website. I would add that there is a second domain name, www.sarahbranson.com, which appears to serve exactly the same purpose and also to have been registered by the Respondent.
- When I examined his website again, I noticed that the Respondent had added more information to it and appeared to have spent time searching the internet for material relating to me. He had copied my chambers' profile and amended it to allege, amongst other things, that I share the human lights policies of China and that I was a murderer. I also noticed that he had copied and annotated an article which the Independent Newspaper had written about me and accused me in this of being a "bent" barrister, defrauding the student loans company and lying about where I live. None of these things are true. In addition to the allegations made concerning a relationship with Geraint Davies the annotated article also contains innuendos of a sexual nature. I investigated having the domain name www.sarahbranson.com awarded to me by contacting the regulatory body ICANN, but was told that the procedure was very difficult I attach the email from ICANN at EH2.
EH2
- Last week. I received a letter from a gentleman in America alerting me to the fact that the Respondent had assumed my identity on the internet and was posting articles in various chat rooms in my name. I attach at EH3 the letter I received. I also received the next day another email from a user of these chat rooms alerting me to the same thing I attach at EH4 a copy of this email. It appears that the Respondent is using the domain name www.sarahbranson.com in an attempt to pose as me on the internet.
EH3
EH4
- I am now extremely concerned about the position this puts me in I attach at EH5 examples of some of the things the Respondent is saying in my name. I am alarmed that he has stated "I don't give a hoot about Arabs, the more of them that are dead, the better off the world will be" (EH5(a)) and is spreading racist and homophobic material in my name (EH5(b)) He is also undermining my professional reputation at EH5(c) and EH5(d) where he accuses someone of being a thug in my name and receives a response asserting that I am an incompetent barrister.
EH5a
EH5b
EH5c
EH5d
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EH5(a)
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Message-ID: xn0dy6551tyvu002@127.0.0.1 - Click here for the Google copy
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EH5(b) [this is the entire EH 5(b)]
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Message-ID: xn0dy2m533y55v004@127.0.0.1 - Click here for the Google copy
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The entire message reproduced in part by Sarah Branson as Exhibit EH5(b)
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Subject: Inside the mind of Jesse Helms (e.g. "Homosexuals are weak, morally sick wretches.")
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"No, I do not. And neither do the people in the armed forces. Mr. Clinton better watch out if he comes down here. He'd better have a bodyguard."
-- When asked in 1994 on CNN if he thought President Clinton was "up to the job" of serving as Commander-in-Chief
"Let me adjust my hearing aid. It could not accommodate the decibels of the Senator from Massachusetts. I can't match him in decibels or Jezebels."
-- After Ted Kennedy made an emotional speech to let foreigners with HIV become US citizens, 1993.
"The New York Times and Washington Post are both infested with homosexuals themselves. Just about every person down there is a homosexual or lesbian."
-- 1995
"The University of Negroes and Communists"
-- Reference to the University of North Carolina devised by Mr. Helms when he worked for Willis Smith's 1950 U.S. Senate campaign.
"All I know is that D'Aubuisson is a free enterprise man and deeply religious."
-- Responding to evidence that Roberto D'Aubuisson directed Salvadoran death squads that murdered thousands of civilians.
"Your tax dollars are being used to pay for grade-school classes that teach our children that CANNIBALISM, WIFE-SWAPPING and MURDER of infants and the elderly are acceptable behaviour."
-- Fund raising mailer, 1996
"All Latins are volatile people. Hence, I was not surprised at the volatile reaction."
-- After Mexicans protested his visit in 1986
"It's their deliberate, disgusting, revolting conduct that is responsible for the disease."
-- Justifying his refusal to give financial support to families of AIDS victims.
"Homosexuals are weak, morally sick wretches."
-- 1995 radio broadcast
"She's a damn lesbian. I am not going to put a lesbian in a position like that. If you want to call me a bigot, fine."
-- Explaining why he was opposing the appointment of a woman for a cabinet post.
"They should ask their parents if it would be all right for their son or daughter to marry a Negro."
-- In response to Duke University students holding a vigil after Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated, 1968
http://www.bettybowers.com/helms.html
Sarah Branson, Barrister at Law, Coram Chambers,
Ground Floor, 4 Brick Court,Temple, London EC4Y 9AD.
http://www.sarahbranson.com/
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Message-ID: xn0dy2m533y55v004@127.0.0.1 - Click here for the Google copy
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- I consider it likely that other internet users will be offended by this information and fear the consequences for my personal safety should someone act out any grievance which arises as a result. The Respondent appears to signing all his internet posts with my full name and professional address.
- I conducted a search of only one of the newsgroups the Respondent is writing in I was alarmed to see that there were over one thousand hits in my name and all those I looked at were signed "Sarah Branson, barrister, 4 Brick Court, Temple." I attach at EH6 the results of the search I made.
EH6
- I understood from the letter and email I received that the Respondent might be posting things on other chat rooms I therefore did 3 further search on Yahoo and found that, in addition to posting things in my name alone, he is also signing things "Geraint Davies and Sarah Branson, 3 Mulgrave Road, Croydon." This is the home address of the Second Applicant and is not information that is otherwise in the pubic domain Geraint Davies lives at this address with his wife and three small children. I attach at EH7 examples of things the Respondent has posted in the name of Geraint Davies and me It is clear at EH7(a) that someone has been offended by what he has been saying in our names.
EH7
- A list of other posts in the name of Geraint Davies and me is attached at EH8. Examples of the posts are "The idolizing of Hitler by Muslims" and "Jews Killing gentiles, okay for money". This clearly places both Mr Davies and myself at risk.
EH8
- I wrote to the Respondent on Tuesday 8 February demanding that he remove this offensive material from the web and desist from assuming my identity in chat rooms and elsewhere on the World Wide Web. I emailed this to him and sent it recorded delivery.
The recorded delivery receipt is at EH9.
I confirmed with the post office that it had been delivered by telephone.
I received a rather strange reply to my email staling that Yahoo deletes unsolicited emails. I believe that this is untrue as I was informed by the operators of the Google website that web service providers cannot generally scrutinise the contents of material sent to or hosted by them. In my view the reply originates from the Respondent and confirms that he has received my email. He has not responded to my requests to desist nor has he responded substantively to my email or letter.
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Original sent at 17:22:40 - response received at 1723.
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Was this response automatic or manual but sent within a minute?
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Does Yahoo! filter unsolicited email, and furnish an automatic "Holiday Response" service?
- Did Royal Mail give Miss Branson given the wrong information by telephone (paragraph 17)?
- Did Google give Miss Branson the wrong information by telephone (paragraph 8)?
- Does Miss Branson believe a manual response to her email was sent within one minute (email)?
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- I am extremely fearful of being placed in personal danger due to the offensive material the Respondent is posting in my name I feel harassed by the behaviour of the
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Respondent and have no idea what he will do next. It seems that rather that getting bored with me as a target for his campaign of harassment and moving on. the situation worsens with every day that passes. I am also afraid, in the light of having reviewed my case notes ham 1999. that there is a real possibility that he might attempt to hurt me physically. I therefore make this application to the Court on a without notice basis for the reasons set out above and due to the urgency of the situation.
- I therefore humbly ask the court to grant the relief I seek.
Statement of Truth
I believe that contents of
this witness statement are true.
Signed S L Branson
Dated 11 February 2005
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