Bulletin readers may recall that the PILA bulletin has already reported on David Miranda’s case. Click here to read more.
David Miranda, partner of Glenn Greenwald, the Guardian journalist who revealed US surveillance secrets leaked by Edward Snowden was detained at Heathrow Airport under Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act 2000. Schedule 7 allows police to stop, search and examine any person at a port, airport or international rail terminal without the need for reasonable suspicion that the individual is involved in terrorist activities. Miranda argued that his detention under schedule 7 for nine hours amounted to his unlawful detention. The material he argued was not related to terrorism but was in fact related to journalism. He argued that his detention, therefore, under Schedule 7 was contrary to a journalist’s right of freedom of expression as guaranteed by Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).
The High Court has ruled against Miranda’s claim that the detention was unlawful. It has ruled that the detention was a “proportionate measure in the circumstances”. The court went on to state that the detention’s “objective was not only legitimate but very pressing”. Lord Justice Laws has ruled that although the detention was “an indirect interference with press freedom” there was “compelling evidence” that the detention was “imperative in the interests of national security”.
Miranda has said that he is going to challenge the decision. "I will appeal [against] this ruling, and keep appealing until the end, not because I care about what the British government calls me, but because the values of press freedom that are at stake are too important to do anything but fight until the end". He went on to say that he was “not happy that a court has formally said that [he] was a legitimate terrorism suspect, but the days of the British empire are long over and this ruling will have no effect outside of the borders of this country."
Click here to read the case in full
Click here to read an article about the case in the Irish Times
Click here to read an article about the case in the Guardian