Legal Aid Battle for Sceptic Prof Ball

[nickcosmosonde]

Apr 9, 2011 20:01:52 GMT 1 @louise said:

To add some context to the libel charge www.desmogblog.com/michael-mann-suing-tim-ball-libel

Dr. Michael Mann, Director of the Earth Systems Science Center at Penn State University, is suing the climate change sceptic Dr. Tim Ball and the think tank/web site Frontier Centre for Public Policy for libel - and particularly for suggesting that Mann is somehow guilty of criminal fraud for his part in what has come to be known as "climategate."

In the interview, an anonymous questioner ("John Doe" in court documents), says this to Ball: Various government and academic agencies have whitewashed the Climategate scandal so far. Do you think anyone will be prosecuted for fraud?" Ball responds, "Michael Mann at Penn State should be in the State Pen, not Penn State."

The Frontier Centre is a Canadian version of the Heartland Institute. The website was reportedly given an opportunity to apologize for the slight, which they declined

So, not a poor little retired prof being dragged through the courts for an off the cuff quip - a direct implication of illegal activity posted (and supported) on a politically motivated blog.

It's not a "direct implication of illegal activity"; it's indirect at most. It could equally be read as "the law should be such that Mann would be convicted of fraud". And with that I entirely agree. I also entirely agree that Mann should be prosecuted - fraud is probably the wrong charge, but misappropriation of public funds would seem to fit the bill. Perhas the two charges amount to the same thing, I'm not an American lawyer.

I agree with Marchesa too, which is the more significant matter about this whole farago. It's hard to imagine any figure in any other academic field resorting to the libel courts on such piffling grounds. Especially not one who has already comprehensively trashed their own reputation for integrity by their own actions. In any other field they would have been dismissed from their post, and crawled away in shame into obscure retirement.

a politically motivated blog

Do you consider the distortions Mann engineered "politically motivated". Louise? Do you think the IPCC is "politically motivated"?

[louise]

Apr 10, 2011 9:46:15 GMT 1 nickcosmosonde said:

I also entirely agree that Mann should be prosecuted - fraud is probably the wrong charge, but misappropriation of public funds would seem to fit the bill. Perhas the two charges amount to the same thing, I'm not an American lawyer.

You may believe that Mann should be prosecuted but the facts are that the investigations to date have not found any grounds to do so.

That does not mean that future investigations may not of course.

I try to keep an open mind (a mindset that Marchesarosa finds offensive for some reason).

[nickcosmosonde]

Apr 10, 2011 9:55:03 GMT 1 @louise said:

Apr 10, 2011 9:46:15 GMT 1 nickcosmosonde said:

I also entirely agree that Mann should be prosecuted - fraud is probably the wrong charge, but misappropriation of public funds would seem to fit the bill. Perhas the two charges amount to the same thing, I'm not an American lawyer.

You may believe that Mann should be prosecuted but the facts are that the investigations to date have not found any grounds to do so.

Who has been doing the investigations, and with what remit?

That does not mean that future investigations may not of course.

I'm not aware of any investigations having been undertaken by the judicial system, with the aim of determining whether his actions amounted to misuse of public funds. Should such an investigation be undertaken, I can't imagine how someone paid to present scientific data in an accurate and impartial manner in order for public bodies to be able to reach decisions could possibly be exonerated if he's been actively suppressing data in order to convey a distorted picture designed to influence that decision-making process. Not only that, but he has been shown to be actively attempting to prevent this suppressed information, as well as any other data that might counter the picture he's so eager to present, from being accessible by any other means. This is not what he's paid for - in fact, it's directly subverting the role that he's paid for.

I try to keep an open mind (a mindset that Marchesarosa finds offensive for some reason).

Probably not. If so, and if you believe this, it seems to me you've probably misunderstood each other.

[louise]

Apr 10, 2011 12:25:47 GMT 1 nickcosmosonde said:

Who has been doing the investigations, and with what remit?

I'm not aware of any investigations having been undertaken by the judicial system, with the aim of determining whether his actions amounted to misuse of public funds.

washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/local-opinion-zone/2011/03/cuccinelli-and-uva-headed-supreme-court-over-manns-emails

and

In April 2010, Cuccinelli served a civil investigative demand on the University of Virginia seeking a broad range of documents related to Michael E. Mann, a climate researcher now at Penn State who was an assistant professor at UVA from 1999 to 2005. Cuccinelli is investigating Mann's putative violation of the 2002 Virginia Fraud Against Taxpayers Act

from wikipedia at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Cuccinelli#Litigation_with_University_of_Virginia

As I said, I'm keeping an open mind as no conclusions have yet been reached.

[nickcosmosonde]

Thankyou Louise, I was aware of these matters. As I said, there has been an UVA investigation, which unsurprisingly exonerated one of their professors. The only attempt at a legal investigation has been consistently blocked - that's my reading of these reports. Cuccinelli is struggling to gain access to the information, is he not? To determine whether a crime has been committed? And he's not being allowed to! One has to wonder why, if there's nothing to hide.


This is astonishing, is it not?

Also in May 2010, the University of Virginia Faculty Senate Executive Council wrote a letter strongly rebuking Cuccinelli for his civil investigative demand of the Mann records, stating that "[Cuccinelli's] action and the potential threat of legal prosecution of scientific endeavor that has satisfied peer-review standards send a chilling message to scientists engaged in basic research involving Earth’s climate and indeed to scholars in any discipline."[48]

Now, tell me if I'm wrong, but it's been several years now that the hockey-stick graph has been acknowledged by the scientific community as being a distortion of the actual record, and is no longer used for that reason. Similarly, the Medieval warm period is now not in dispute, is it? These are facts - if Mann's distortions and attempts at suppression of them met "peer-review standards", this is a condemnation of those standards, not an exoneration of Mann. And how and why could a criticism of such deliberate distortions and suppressions - and a possible investigation into whether such acts broke a law designed to maintain standards in the public service - send a chilling message to researchers or scholars in this or any other field? Surely it is an integral part of the scientific method - and professional and methodological standards in any other academic field - that one does not cherry-pick facts to support a theory, that one does not suppress facts that contrdict it, that one presents one's evidence in as accurate and least misleading manner possible, that one should not attempt to silence critics of one's theory or facts, that one should not attempt to prevent access to the academic community's journals by those critics, etcetera etcetera? Does any researcher or scholar need to be reminded of these basic truths? If so, things are a great deal worse than I imagined.

[louise]

Apr 10, 2011 13:23:00 GMT 1 nickcosmosonde said:

The only attempt at a legal investigation has been consistently blocked - that's my reading of these reports. Cuccinelli is struggling to gain access to the information, is he not? To determine whether a crime has been committed? And he's not being allowed to! One has to wonder why, if there's nothing to hide.

That's not my reading of the first court ruling on this matter voices.washingtonpost.com/virginiapolitics/2010-08-30%20Opinion%20Granting%20UVA%20Petition.pdf

This court rules that the two CIDS in question do not show a "reason to believe" that the University of Virginia is in possession of relevant materials to a false claims law investigation and have not stated the "nature of the conduct" with sufficiency to satisfy the requirement of the statute

To me that reads that the court is not convinced that there is a case to answer.

I do not wish to get into an argument regarding the correctness or otherwise of the hockey stick in this thread. The point here, I believe, is whether he has been slandered by the implication that he should be imprisoned.

To date, there is no evidence that he has broken any US laws. I remain open minded as to the conclusions of the legal enquiries. I'll wait and see but I believe everyone has the right to be treated as innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.

[nickcosmosonde]

Apr 10, 2011 13:34:28 GMT 1 @louise said:

Apr 10, 2011 13:23:00 GMT 1 nickcosmosonde said:

The only attempt at a legal investigation has been consistently blocked - that's my reading of these reports. Cuccinelli is struggling to gain access to the information, is he not? To determine whether a crime has been committed? And he's not being allowed to! One has to wonder why, if there's nothing to hide.

That's not my reading of the first court ruling on this matter

Well, then we must agree to disagree. It seems very clear to me. Cuccinelli is attempting to have access to the UVA investigation so that he can determine whether Mann has defrauded the State. In order to do so he has to first present reasons he believes this may have occurred. And the court determined:

"However, it is not clear what he did that was misleading, false or fraudulent in obtaining funds from the Commonwealth of Virginia."

And has so denied him his petition.

Now, as I said, I'm not an American lawyer, and am not particularly interested in any case, whether this is a correct interpretation of the law. I am merely contending that Ball is perfectly justified in asserting that the Law should be otherwise than this. Whether Mann obtained his funding fraudulently should be besides the point. What should be the point is that having obtained said funds he then went on to present misleading information. And according to what he said, Ball considers that this should be against the Law, and so Mann should be in the slammer for it. You might disagree with that opinion - I don't - but it's not a libellous statement.

This court rules that the two CIDS in question do not show a "reason to believe" that the University of Virginia is in possession of relevant materials to a false claims law investigation and have not stated the "nature of the conduct" with sufficiency to satisfy the requirement of the statute

To me that reads that the court is not convinced that there is a case to answer.

That may be so. But what is the "case to answer"? Not the one the Court has ruled on, from Cuccinelli's point of view, I suspect; certainly not from Ball's.

I do not wish to get into an argument regarding the correctness or otherwise of the hockey stick in this thread.

Very sensible of you!

The point here, I believe, is whether he has been slandered by the implication that he should be imprisoned.

As I said, whether he "should be imprisoned" can be adjudged according to, a) whether he committed a criminal act; or, b) whether the law should be such that what he did do should be a criminal act.

I see no possible way of rationally deciding by a reading of Ball's words which of these two assertions Ball was making. The first interpretation might have been a slander; the second is not: it's a commentary on the legal code.

To date, there is no evidence that he has broken any US laws. I remain open minded as to the conclusions of the legal enquiries. I'll wait and see but I believe everyone has the right to be treated as innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.

Agreed. If only matters were so simple and practically decidable though. In order for Ball to be "treated as innocent" he has to meet his defence bills first. If he finds funding from a foundation or group that is in any way "politically motivated" as you put it, he exposes himself to the usual mudslinging impugnations of his integrity. Mann on the other hand is allowed to instigate such a frivolous and expensive action with funding from such a "politically motivated" group and no one raises an eyebrow.

[louise]

Apr 10, 2011 15:17:33 GMT 1 nickcosmosonde said:

Mann on the other hand is allowed to instigate such a frivolous and expensive action with funding from such a "politically motivated" group and no one raises an eyebrow.

Oh I think there are plenty of eyebrows being raised.

However, Cuccinelli himself doesn't seem to think that there is much of a case either

Mr. Cuccinelli maintains that he is not pursuing Dr. Mann for his climate change research, which shows a rapid warming in the late 20th century unprecedented for at least 1,000 years — results that skeptical researchers have challenged. The investigation is about financial improprieties, he says.

But in an interview several months ago, he conceded that his chances of finding evidence of financial fraud in Dr. Mann’s e-mails were indeed low.

“Frankly, I would say the odds are there is nothing like that,” he said. “But we don’t know that.”

Makes me wonder why he is pursuing this case.

green.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/12/hearing-is-set-in-climate-fraud-case/

[nickcosmosonde]

Apr 10, 2011 16:11:29 GMT 1 @louise said:

Apr 10, 2011 15:17:33 GMT 1 nickcosmosonde said:

Mann on the other hand is allowed to instigate such a frivolous and expensive action with funding from such a "politically motivated" group and no one raises an eyebrow.

Oh I think there are plenty of eyebrows being raised.

Oh good. Yours?

However, Cuccinelli himself doesn't seem to think that there is much of a case either

Mr. Cuccinelli maintains that he is not pursuing Dr. Mann for his climate change research, which shows a rapid warming in the late 20th century unprecedented for at least 1,000 years — results that skeptical researchers have challenged. The investigation is about financial improprieties, he says.

Of course. It can't be against the law to conduct "research". The issue is whether he's been contracted to conduct scientific research and instead has presented deliberately distorted results. For example, that he has suppressed scientific data to conclude that there is "a rapid warming in the late 20th century unprecedented for at least 1,000 years" when in fact , as his own research demonstrates, this is not true at all.

But in an interview several months ago, he conceded that his chances of finding evidence of financial fraud in Dr. Mann’s e-mails were indeed low.

“Frankly, I would say the odds are there is nothing like that,” he said. “But we don’t know that.”

Makes me wonder why he is pursuing this case.

I would say the odds are low too, because of my intuitive understanding of what "fraud" means - an understanding that it wouldn't surprise me in the least is seriously deficient. I doubt whether Mann did what he did in order to obtain personal financial benefit. I doubt whether that was what Ball was implying, either.

As for why he's pursuing the case...Because, as I said, a "misappropriation of public funds" charge seems more to my mind to fit the bill. Maybe that's not "fraud"; maybe that's not a criminal offence in Virginia; maybe anyone who wishes to prosecute such a charge needs to first demonstrate reasons for supposing "fraud" had occurred...maybe, maybe, maybe. But all these maybes are irrelevant to what I think Ball meant - that what Mann did should have been prosecutable.

[marchesarosa]

Phew, Nick, you've got it sussed! Well argued.

[marchesarosa]

"Lawyering Up" by the IPCC clique and their henchmen is being discussed on Judith Curry's blog, Climate Etc here

judithcurry.com/2011/04/09/lawyering-up/#more-2863

[nickcosmosonde]

I think she lets Mann off very lightly there. She lets the IPCC off very lightly too.

As far as I'm concerned a scientist has consciously suppressed scientific data in order to present a thesis that he believes in. He's presented the distorted data in a statistically disreputable manner in order to present this thesis in the most dramatic manner. The IPCC have given a great boost to this man's career because of these anti-scientific manipulations. Shame on them both.