Crown court spectator jailed for laughing at jury and talking back to the judge
Michael Moynihan was jailed after he was spotted pointing and laughing at jurors.
Michael Moynihan / Facebook
A crown court spectator has been jailed for contempt after a judge spotted him laughing at the jury as he watched the end of a complex £150million tax fraud trial from the public gallery.
Construction worker Michael Moynihan, 31, was seen pointing at jurors and sniggering to a friend as Judge Steven Everett was finishing his summing up of 14 weeks of evidence on March 27.
Moynihan was asked to leave the courtroom by staff but he initially refused to go and then declined to give his name.
When asked to leave immediately by the judge he answered back: “You ought to be patient.”
Michael Moynihan answered back to a judge after he was told to leave the court.
Michael Moynihan / Facebook
He was subsequently arrested and it was discovered that he had been at the court for a different trial over unrelated public order matters.
Moynihan of Ellesmere Port, Cheshire who lost his left leg in accident in 2021, was jailed for 21 days after being found guilty of contempt of court.
Everett said if the jury members had asked themselves why he had been pointing and laughing at them, it could have led to the trial being abandoned.
He described Moynihan’s actions as “threatening and arrogant”.
The trial itself was part of criminal proceedings that had been ongoing for 10 years that had cost the taxpayer hundreds of thousands of pounds.
The judge told Moynihan: “It’s important that everybody understands that the court is a place where people have to behave.
"If people do not behave in a court, we are heading down the road to anarchy and that is a problem.
”I found your behaviour threatening and arrogant. It was not just rude, it was way beyond that and what concerned me most was it was threatening to the jury. I see that they saw that."
Michael Moynihan was jailed for 21 days at Chester Crown Court.
Reuters
The judge told Moynihan he had “an enormous chip on his shoulder”and had behaved in a “horrible way” to the jurors.
Moynihan's counsel Kay Driver said her client had been on pain killers that made him “too relaxed”, adding that he believed the person on the jury was someone he had gone to school with and pointed him out to his friend.
Driver said Moynihan “apologises for his language and behaviour” adding “He realises now that could be very intimidating to a jury member.”
Despite fears the trial might have to be abandoned due to them feeling intimidated, the panel later convicted two men including the mastermind of a fake designer clothing scam who ran one of the UK’s largest ever carousel tax frauds.