Aberdeen Sheriff Court, 27th September
Sheriff Margaret Hodge, presiding
Sheriff Hodge began by inviting procurator fiscal depute James Dunbar to address her regarding the notes Sheriff McLaughlin had made at the previous hearings and the opportunity the court had granted for prosecutors to report back from the police regarding copying of my data files for my defence.
Dunbar, apparently the lead prosecutor in this case, reverted to the prosecutors' earlier claim there was "no obligation to disclose" the computer data. Seemingly he was unfamiliar or in denial that the defence arguments and reasons for disclosure of evidence and the return of my irreplaceable scientific research data, which I had outlined, in his absence, to Sheriff McLaughlin in the previous intermediate diets of 29th July, 7th and 13th of September, had been understood by the court, the reporter for the Press and Journal and their readers, the good people of Aberdeen and the North-East of Scotland, if not as yet by him, Dunbar, the slow-learner.
Sheriff Hodge asked me to reiterate those arguments and reasons and I did so.
When then pressed by Sheriff Hodge, Dunbar admitted to police "technical difficulties" in copying the data.
Sheriff Hodge ordered another intermediate diet, for the 18th October 2016, before Sheriff McLaughlin and then I found the presence of mind to point out to Sheriff Hodge the prejudice of proceeding to trial regardless without first hearing the defence's arguments that it was inappropriate to proceed to trial in this case, for the reasons stated in my plea email of 15th June 2015 (quoted in my previous blog post of 14th September).
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