The Bizarre Trial of Richard D. Hall - Part 2

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I have not received any encouragement or inducement from anyone to write about or discuss any information related to the Manchester Attack. All research discussed is exclusively my own and based solely upon information freely available in the public domain.

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In Part 1 we looked at the potential implications of the possible ruling in the trial. Nominally a civil claim for harassment and GDPR breaches, in the concluding summation offered by Mr Hibbert’s barrister, Mr Price, the discussion centred on how the ruling may set a case precedent relevant to the UK’s legal interpretation of, specifically, Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) which establishes right to “freedom of expression.”

The case has potential ramifications for the freedom of the press. Perhaps setting boundaries regarding who the press can criticise, who they can’t and under what circumstances. It is notable that legacy media propaganda outlets, such as the Daily Mail, have changed their tone considerably.

Prior to the trial, the legacy media were content to brand Hall a conspiracy theorist and to attack him personally. The Mail described Hall as “Britain’s sickest man” because he reported the evidence exposing the Manchester Arena bombing as a hoax. Now they refer to Hall as a former “TV producer.”

Hall, of course, is still the same man he was before the trial. It is only the propaganda that has shifted. There are perhaps a couple of possible reasons for this.

As we shall see, Hall presented a very robust defence of his position. He maintained—with good reason—that the observable physical evidence shows Manchester was a hoaxed false flag. If you are interested in the evidence you can grab a PDF copy of Richard’s book Manchester: The Night of the Bang for FREE. Alternatively, you can support Hall by purchasing a paperback copy. Anyone who has read Hall’s investigation and is aware of the evidence will understand why he has so steadfastly defended his view.

I certainly found the evidence he investigated and reported compelling. I conducted further research not only verifying Hall’s findings but unearthing more evidence which fully corroborates Hall’s contention that Manchester was a hoax. You can read The Manchester Attack: An Independent Investigation—also freely available as a PDF.

It is possible, having been shown some of the evidence investigated and reported by Hall, that Mrs Justice Steyn—ruling on the trial—may have further questions of her own about the official narrative of the Manchester Arena bombing. The legacy media, such as the Daily Mail, have never asked any questions and have not investigated the evidence at all. Casting Hall as some sort of crackpot—for no evident reason—may make the legacy media look very foolish indeed. Showing a little more common courtesy and respect for Hall now may be the start of some hasty backtracking and an attempt to distance themselves from previous unwarranted assaults on his character.

The second possibility is that any subsequent case precedent, that may reinterpret current UK law—with regard to reading of the ECHR—would be difficult to apply to all independent journalists if the ruling is supposedly based upon the ravings of a crank. By belatedly referring to Hall is a “former TV producer” and recognising his work in the independent media, any potential future restriction on press freedom of opinion and expression will perhaps carry more legal weight.

But this wider, possible curtailment of press freedom is not what the case was “supposedly” about. It was meant to be a civil claim of harassment and GDPR breaches that the claimants—Arena “victims” Martin and Eve Hibbert (father and daughter)—brought to the High Court of Justice against Richard D. Hall.

A reasonable defence under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 [PfH ‘97] is that the defendant’s “course of conduct” was pursued “for the purpose of preventing or detecting crime.” Therefore Richard D. Hall initially sought to defend himself under Section 1(3)(a)—detecting of a crime—and 1(3)(c) of the PfH ‘97 which states that a claim of harassment cannot be upheld if the defendant can show “that in the particular circumstances the pursuit of the course of conduct was reasonable.”

In order to demonstrate the reasonableness of his course of conduct, Hall offered the evidence he had uncovered which shows the Manchester Arena so-called bombing was, in fact, a hoaxed false flag, to the High Court of Justice. Thus presumably hoping to demonstrate to the High Court that he was a journalist investigating a potential crime of immense importance and public interest.

As the claimants had filed a claim against him, Hall was free to challenge any aspect of that claim. In a pre-trial hearing these aspects were referred to, by High Court Master Davison, as “the issues.” Hall challenged the claimants to prove the following:

1 — On 22 May 2017 22 innocent people were murdered in a bomb explosion carried out by a terrorist at the Manchester Arena at the conclusion of a concert performed by Ariana Grande;

2 — The claimants were present at the Manchester Arena at the time of the alleged bombing;

3 — They were severely injured by that bomb rendering Martin Hibbert [claimant] paralysed from the waist down and Eve Hibbert [claimant] brain damaged; and

4 — The cause of these injuries was the explosion of the bomb.

On 8th February 2024, Master Davison issued a “summary judgement” stating that he did not “propose to engage with the detail of the defendant’s evidence.” Master Davison ruled that Hall could not present any of the evidence, he had investigated and reported, in his own defence. Without directly referencing any of Hall’s evidence, Master Davison summarily dismissed all of it and said Hall’s “staged attack hypothesis” was “absurd and fantastical” and did not provide any “basis to rebut” any of “the issues.”

Hall applied to the High Court to see the CCTV footage, that was said to exist, substantiating that the claimants were at the Arena. Master Davison rejected this application.

Hall applied to see some contemporaneous medical evidence, such as hospital records, to show that the claimants were injured by a bomb in the City Room (foyer) of the Manchester Arena at 22.31 on 22nd May 2017. This application was rejected by Master Davison.

Hall has repeatedly appealed against Master Davison’s summary judgement but without success.

It is worth noting, both throughout these legal proceedings and in media reports he has made, Hall has consistently stated that he would be willing to revise his “staged attack hypothesis” if he could just see some evidence to substantiate the official narrative of a bombing and the claimants accounts of being injured by a bomb. To date that evidence has not been made publicly available and Hall’s applications to see it have been firmly denied.

Therefore, on day one of the trial, Hall’s scope for mounting a meaningful defence under the PfH ‘97 were severely restricted. Unable to question the assertions of the prosecution, which were repeatedly referred to by the prosecution as “the facts,” it is testimony to the skill of both Hall—under cross examination—and his defence barrister, Mr Paul Oakley, that the trial was far from a fait accompli for the prosecution.

The trial began with the prosecution laying out their case. A number of legacy media outlets covered the trial, some from the court and others via live video links.

Mr Price—barrister for the prosecution—started by explaining that the central facts appertaining to the bombing were not in dispute. This was true—within the context of the trial—because the previous summary judgement of Master Davison effectively barred Hall’s defence from questioning them.

The prosecution said that the claimed GDPR breaches were subservient to the primary claim of harassment.

As Eve Hibbert has a brain injury, she was represented by her mother, Miss Sarah Gillbard. The prosecution noted that Miss Gillbard was eager to protect Eve from undue scrutiny of her medical condition. Therefore, the court had agreed that a written statement about Eve’s medical condition from Miss Sarah Gillbard—Eve Hibbert’s mother—would not be disclosed to the court or discussed during the trial, but that it had been shared with the defence. The defence accepted this without challenge.

Mr Price outlined that the claimed bombing had changed Mr Hibbert’s life in every way. Not only had he been physically and psychologically injured, he had subsequently stepped forward as an advocate for the purported bomb victims. The bombing had become a “big part” of Mr Hibbert’s life.

Mr Price spoke about the summary judgement and recounted the evidence offered to Master Davison by the claimants which Master Davison accepted as proof of the bombing and the claimants’ presence in the City Room—when the bomb allegedly detonated—and the consequent injuries. This included Mr Price claiming that the claimants had been seen on CCTV in the Arena and the City Room. To date, no one else, other than Martin Hibbert, his solicitor and an unnamed family liaison officer, have ever allegedly seen this reported evidence.

Mr Price correctly highlighted that the defendant—Richard D. Hall—rejects both the official account of the bombing and therefore, by extension, every aspect of the Hibberts’ public and legal claims. The prosecution said Hall accuses the Hibberts’ of being “crisis actors” and of lying.

Mr Price then read some passages from Hall’s book: Manchester: the Night of the Bang. He used this to describe, what Master Davison termed Hall’s “staged attack hypothesis.”

Mr Price effectively alleged that Hall considers the absence of evidence as evidence of absence. That is, unless Hall has evidence proving the claimants account he assumes the accounts are false. With regard to an interview Mr Hibbert gave to Channel 4, Mr Price said that Hall’s observations following that interview were “preposterous” and “insulting” to the claimants.

Mr Price alleged that Mr Hall had focused on the injuries sustained by Eve Hibbert. In August 2019 Hall had visited the home of Miss Gillbard to try to secure an interview. Unable to get a response, he left a dashcam running in his legally parked car on the street near Gillbard’s home. He filmed who he presumed was Eve being assisted into a vehicle. From this Hall surmised, and wrote, that Eve Hibbert was almost certainly using a wheelchair.

It was claimed that this visit brought Eve’s condition and her injuries, reportedly sustained from the Manchester “bomb,” to the attention of her neighbours and soon to the rest of the street. This was supposedly contrary to the wishes of Eve and Miss Gillbard.

Mr Price asserted that there was no journalistic rationale justifying Hall’s actions and that no “public interest” was served by him visiting Gillbard’s home or filming the street outside their property. Hall’s actions, Mr Price argued, had caused the claimants alarm, distress and “fear.”

The claimants—Mr Price’s clients—felt threatened, not only by Mr Hall but also by his “followers.” They feared what these “followers” might do as a consequence of Mr Hall’s book, film and other reports.

Therefore, Mr Price continued, by denying the bombing and analysing the public statements made by one of the claimants (Mr Hibbert) and by focusing upon the nature of Eve Hibbert’s injuries—questioning how they were sustained—and by bringing Eve’s status as a “bomb victim” to the attention of her neighbours, Mr Hall had created an adverse environment for the claimants.

Mr Price said they felt like they were constantly under surveillance both by Hall and his “followers” who similarly believed Hall’s “conspiracies.” He said that by openly questioning their accounts, Hall thereby accused the claimants of lying and caused them additional, unnecessary distress.

The accuracy or inaccuracy of Mr Hall’s “hypothesis” was not, Mr Price argued, germane to the question of harassment. While truthfulness may be considered as a mitigating factor in any subsequent ruling, it was independent of the alleged harassing effect of Hall’s “course of conduct.” It was Hall’s conduct, regardless of his hypothesis, that constituted harassment of his clients, Mr Price said.

He then added that Hall could not claim any mitigation in this case because the truth had been established. His hypothesis, that there was no bomb, was preposterous and absurd in any event and this had been established by Master Davison in his summary judgement ruling, according to Mr Price.

Mr Price then forwarded a clever if quite astounding argument. He alleged that Hall assumed his clients were lying and, therefore, believed Manchester was a hoax.

In reality, Hall has uncovered evidence that appears to prove Manchester was a hoax. Hall subsequently questioned the claimant’s accounts because, in light of this evidence, it seems their accounts cannot possibly be true. However, the effect of the summary judgement—barring Hall from presenting this evidence—allowed Mr Price to effectively assert that Hall had no reason to question the accounts provided by his clients. It is important to bear in mind that the claimants applied to the court for the summary judgement.

Mr Hall’s defence was then free to make it’s arguments and question the prosecution’s witnesses. The first to take the stand was Mr Martin Hibbert and it is the cross examination of his witness testimony by Defence Barrister Mr Oakley that we will begin with in Part 3.