Marcus Ball V Boris Johnson, the prosecution case.
The Boris Johnson Prosecution Case
For the alleged offence of misconduct in public office
This was the crowdfunded private prosecution case against Mr Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from Marcus J Ball(left).
The case attempted to address dishonest claims made by Mr Johnson during the EU Referendum by setting a precedent against lying in politics. Proving that it is illegal for elected public office holders to lie to the public about matters of great public importance.
Despite initially achieving a summons ruling against Boris Johnson at Westminster Magistrates' Court The case was unfortunately shut down and prevented from reaching the Supreme Court by the Divisional Court.
Basic case summary
According to HM Treasury the most amount of money we've ever 'paid' to the EU is £14 billion 646 million in 2015. Weekly, this amounts to £280.88 million a week. In other years the figures are much lower.
Boris Johnson’s claim that ‘We send the EU £20 billion a year’ is false by more than £5 billion of public spending a year at minimum. We have evidence that he knew this claim was false.
Members of Parliament have a core duty of scrutiny including a case law defined obligation to be honest with the public when criticising public spending figures. We allege that he greatly abused this duty and as a result damaged public trust in the systems of Parliament, democracy and government.
Misconduct in public office is a criminal offence focused upon abuse of the duties of public office holders. We have prosecuted Mr Johnson for this offence but the case has been ruled to go no further.
The video below explains why it was that we were bringing this case. We will exhaust absolutely every route available to us in our pursuit of justice on this matter. Mr Johnson is innocent unless proven guilty and we are not guaranteed success in this action. However, it is my belief that our country and our species must be better than this. We must try everything we can to set a precedent against lying in politics. If words mean nothing then communication, public trust and good governance are impossible.
Thank you for your consideration.
Marcus J Ball
Private Prosecutor
Why our backers supported us
As of September 2019 we had more than 15,000 financial backers who had supported us over four different crowdfunds in the last three years.
Financial Reporting
Marcus published very detailed spending reports for Stop Lying In Politics Ltd. for the benefit of his backers and the general public. These reports will be completed and up to date following the company's insolvency proceedings coming to an end.
Further reading
Marcus's research document provides an analysis of the salient points (up to September 2018) included within this further reading. However, several other sources have been made available for the public's ease of use just in case they wish to check Marcus's reasoning.
Case submitted
Lewis Power QC's Note was submitted to Westminster Magistrate's Court in February 2019. It's essentially a basic summary of the case. The High Court chose not to reference this information, despite it forming the basis of our case.Not yet published.
Our application for permission to appeal
Jason Coppel QC, a Deputy High Court judge himself, and the team then submitted their application for permission to appeal the case to the Supreme Court. The application highlighted the High Court's errors in law and argued that the case was one of great public importance given it concerned elected public office holders lying to the public about the spending of the public purse. Not yet published.
The High Court's response to our application
The judges who made the decision on our application were the same judges who had originally ruled against us. We can't show you anything here because they did not provide any oral or written ruling aside from to write 'no, no, no' in response to our application. They refused permission, certification or a hearing. I feel that they simply wanted to shut us down but didn't have a legal reason for it and so didn't produce one. We are currently working on our response to this.
HM Treasury European Union Finances
This report from HM Treasury details the UK's spending on European Union Finances. It is published every year and presented to MPs in the House of Commons. It is important to our case because it establishes the actual amounts of money 'sent' or 'paid
to the EU every year since we first joined. It also makes clear that the 'rebate' is not sent to the EU.
GLA Code of Conduct
As Mayor of London Boris Johnson was required to sign his agreement to abide by this code of conduct from the Greater London Authority. It includes several duties concerning required levels of conduct by the Mayor. This code requires the Mayor not to bring his office into 'disrepute'.
R V Mitchell 2014
This ruling is of great importance to our case because of Mitchell's three stage test. The first two questions are 'First, what is the position held? Second, what is the nature of the duties undertaken by the employee or officer in that position?' The duties of elected public office holders and abuse of those duties is of central importance to our action. The question of 'acting as such' cannot be answered unless the duties of a Member of Parliament are understood first.
R V Obeid 2015
R V Obeid is a case from the Court of Criminal Appeal, Supreme Court of New South Wales. It involves the offence of misconduct in public office by an elected Member of Parliament. The Quach case is of great importance to this case and the question of 'acting as such'. Parliamentary Privilege is also discussed.
Attorney General's Reference 3 of 2003
This case is very important because it is the most recent attempt to define the offence in UK law. However, its definition is not complete as it deliberately chooses not to define the meaning of 'acting as such'. It also refers to the Hong Kong definition with no apparent criticism.
R V Quach 2010
This is a wonderful case of great importance as it's the only case we can find which spends a great deal of time and effort carefully analysing the meaning of the phrase 'acting as such'. It consults UK, Hong Kong, Australian and other jurisdictions. The Mitchell case is of value in a different way, Quach was most carefully carried out.
R V Chapman
This case is important because it rules that the threshold test for abuse of public trust is a matter of fact for the jury, not a question of law for the judge. ‘Whether such a situation is revealed by the evidence is a matter that a jury has to decide.' R V France 2016 came to the same conclusion.
The Wallis Case
This case took place in response to the Plebgate scandal. A police officer was prosecuted for misconduct in public office because he lied to his Member of Parliament and police colleagues when he claimed that he had witnessed the incident. In reality he had not. He was given 1 year in prison for a lying based misconduct offence.
R V Cosford
‘The issues for the jury were whether the appellants or any of them held a public office; whether each, in turn, wilfully misconducted herself in the performance of her public duties; and whether the conduct of each, in turn was such as to be deserving of criminal condemnation and sanction. The latter two questions were issues of fact for the jury'
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