Tom Hayes Travesty of Justice – the first anniversary #FREETOMHAYES

Tom Hayes has now been incarcerated in a high security jail for one year.  He has four and a half years left to serve, followed by a further 5 and a half years on a tag, liable to recall to prison at any time.

Tom, an Aspergic former trader, suffered a trial that was so unfair it is almost unthinkable in Britain in this day and age.  Over the last year, it has become apparent to the THSG that most Britons have no idea what goes on in the British criminal justice system, or just how badly some people are abused by the prosecution as they proceed through it.  Unfortunately, we live in a day and age where the media reports such abuses less and less frequently, and this needs to change.

Tom Hayes stood trial for LIBOR “manipulation” in 2015.  The trial, prosecuted by the Serious Fraud Office, was politically motivated, funded with “blockbuster” funding from George Osborne’s Treasury.

In his trial, Tom Hayes was denied virtually all of the evidence that proved his defence, that proved he was telling the truth in the witness box, that proved his innocence, leading to his family branding it a show trial.  Over and above that, despite being on the Autistic Spectrum, Tom’s jury did not hear any medical evidence nor any explanation as to how Tom’s Asperger’s could have affected him in his work.

There remain serious questions to be asked about how Tom Hayes’s trial was allowed to proceed on the basis that it did, and why the Court of Appeal did not see fit to overturn this travesty of justice.

Tom has been locked up for doing his job the way everyone around him did the job, and had done the job for the last 20 years; the way management and senior management had asked him to do the job; for doing the job in accordance with a written instruction in existence at one of his former employer banks; for conforming to market practices that both the British Bankers’ Association and the Bank of England were well aware of.  Tom was still at primary school when the practices for which he has been convicted as a “ring master” started.  Tom joined a bank trading desk in his early 20s and, learning on the job, copied everyone else.  Tom did not know he was doing anything wrong.

Since the conclusion of Tom’s trial, more and more evidence is coming into the public domain that Tom should have been provided with for his trial.  Some of this evidence was absolutely critical to Tom’s defence.  It remains unclear who – bank or prosecutor – has failed to provide the information to Tom, but the result is an innocent man sitting in a high security jail serving a 14, reduced to 11, year prison sentence, paying for the transgressions of the mighty and powerful in banking and fulfilling the political desire to lock up someone, anyone, who worked in a bank to avoid scrutiny of the politicians’ role in the financial crisis.

The general public, distracted by the undesirable language of traders in online chats and emails, remain unaware that they have been duped about both the LIBOR trials and the general culpability for the LIBOR scandal. They remain unaware that the traders being prosecuted were asking for correct LIBOR rates, but the senior managers who requested incorrect rates during the lowballing period have not been investigated, let alone prosecuted.  They remain unaware that some managers have been exonerated by the regulator while other more junior staff get 14 year prison sentences for identical behaviour.  They remain unaware that, in Tom Hayes’s case, one of his former employer banks did not disclose 8 million pieces of evidence directly relevant to the trial and located at the bank’s headquarters, along with the senior management, but the judge allowed the trial to proceed regardless.

The LIBOR trials have been funded by the tax payer, and we can’t help but wonder what the tax payer would make of the unfairness inherent in them if they knew.  We wonder what the tax payer would make of the fact the Serious Fraud Office originally decided not to accept the LIBOR scandal for investigation because of the opinion that there was no criminality involved.  We wonder how the tax payer would view paying many, many millions of pounds for trials and lengthy prison sentences for traders that have not actually broken the law and are innocent.

Everyone seems to be completely unaware that, in fact, the Serious Fraud Office has not prosecuted anybody responsible for the financial crisis.

But the truth about LIBOR will come out, one day, because it always does.  And as more and more traders and submitters come forward and are willing to speak out, and as those currently incarcerated are released, the closer we get to that day.  The Serious Fraud Office can’t hide from what they have done forever, no matter how powerful their friends are.

#FREETOMHAYES