A judge of the four-member Appellate Division bench that upheld war criminal Kamaruzzaman’s death penalty yesterday, ordered Bangladesh-based British journalist David Bergman to leave the courtroom for using his mobile phone there.
Just after the verdict was delivered, Bergman was working on his phone inside the courtroom which was against the rules.
Having noticed that, Justice AHM Shamsuddin Choudhury Manik asked him to leave the court. “You are not supposed to use mobile phone in the court. Using mobile phone in the courtroom is prohibited,” he said.
Bergman was still sitting although rules suggest that when a court says something to someone, that person must stand up. Then some lawyers present in the court advised Bergman to stand up.
The judge then told Bergman: “Stand up and show respect to the court.” He then stood up and said something that could not be heard at the back of the packed courtroom.
The court then said: “You committed the same offence in the past. You have been warned but you do not seem to care.”
Informing Bergman that a notice put up outside the courtroom explains everything about mobile phone’s usage in court, Justice Shamsuddin asked him to leave.
Bergman, who is criticised by justice-seekers and campaigners for his controversial comments on the war crimes trial process, then left the courtroom and immediately posted a status on Facebook terming the incident his “own personal drama.”
He said in the status: “...out of habit, I took my phone out of my pocket, and suddenly within a few seconds of it being in my hand, Justice [AHM Shamsuddin Choudhury] Manik, one of the appellate court judges shouted at me for doing so, telling me that no phones were allowed in the court. I had been warned earlier, he said.
“I said ‘Your honour, I had not been warned earlier.’ I was then told there was a notice outside the court. It was then intimated that I should leave the court.”
Towards the end of the status, Bergman wrote: “...I think just about everybody had one [mobile phone] in their pockets, since the guards were not checking at the door, and I am not sure many, or any, are aware of the notice, or abide by it. Anyway, I was just the fool who took it out of his pocket!!”
When contacted, SM Kuddus Zaman, acting registrar of the Supreme Court, told the Dhaka Tribune: “According to the court’s order, using mobile phones in the courtroom is prohibited. The notice has been put up at the entrance of every courtroom.”
Bergman is facing contempt charges at the International Crimes Tribunal.
In April, one of the tribunals decided to hear the charges against Bergman for contesting the number of people who died in the Liberation War. In his blog, Bergman wrote that there was almost no evidence that supported the official number, three million, of Liberation War martyrs.