A
6.
By this application, issued on 18th May 2016, the claimants allege that the defendant is
guilty of breaching clauses 8(a) and (c) of Mr Justice Holroyde’s order of
1st December 2015. This is supported by an affidavit of Karen Elizabeth McIlwaine, a
solicitor with the claimant Council. Before turning to the substantive allegations, I
must deal with questions of procedure. The order of Mr Justice Holroyde contains the
requisite penal notice. The claimants’ attempts to serve the order personally on the
defendant were unsuccessful. As Ms McIlwaine’s affidavit records, and I accept,
attempts were made on a number of occasions but he evaded service. In consequence,
an application was made on 17th February 2016 for permission under CPR 81.24 to
dispense with personal service. Mr Justice Leggatt so ordered on 23rd March 2016. In
any event, the defendant, Mr Pickthall, had sent a copy of the order of
1st December 2015 to the Court of Appeal on 7th December 2015 in his unsuccessful
application for permission to appeal that order, so evidently he had a copy in his
possession. The present application notice contains the requisite information and was
served personally on the defendant on 19th May 2016 by a process server and the
defendant has attended on this and the previous hearings.
7.
As to the substantive law in such allegations, I remind myself that in order to establish
that someone is in contempt it is necessary to show that:
B
C
D
(i)
he knew of the terms of the order;
(ii)
that he acted (or failed to act) in a manner which involved a breach of the order;
(iii) he knew of the facts which made his conduct a breach.
See, for example, McCann v Bennett [2013] EWHC 283 (QB), per Mr Justice
Tugendhat, at paragraph 127. The burden of proof is of course on the claimants and
the standard of proof is the criminal standard.
E
8.
The allegations are set out as is required within the application notice in the form of
eight grounds. I will not set out the full details of what it is alleged that he had done.
In particular, I will not set out the details of what he has published on the website
because that would serve merely to re-ventilate his allegations in a public forum and
thus to circumvent and thus to defeat the very purpose of the injunction in this case.
For a similar approach, see again, McCann v Bennett, per Mr Justice Tugendhat, at
paragraph 85.
9.
The first ground is that the defendant is guilty of breaching paragraph 8(c) of the order
by publishing on his website a posting entitled “Cheshire Police, judicial review,
refusing to investigate serious crime”, from on or about 11th February 2016. That is
published on the internet to the public at large or a section of it from that date. As is
confirmed by consideration of the publication, this alleges that Mr David Finlay, the
third claimant, and an employee and officer of the first claimant, is engaged in
criminality and is dishonest. I pause there to say that similar accusations were made
against Mr Finlay which led to the previous finding of contempt by Mr Justice
Holroyde. That is said to be in breach of paragraph 8(c).
10.
Ground 2 again concerns paragraph 8(c). This refers to publication on the website
from on or about 12th February 2016 of a posting entitled, “How do you spot a corrupt
Cheshire West Council officer/councillor?” That publication, on reading it, alleges
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