A former MI5 worker will be sectioned indefinitely, a court has decided. Jurors heard how he leaked secrets to an unnamed foreign state. Juan Joseph, an IT worker for the UK’s internal security agency, reportedly emailed secret information during a mental health episode.

The National reported that Joseph:

even travelled overseas attempting to arrange a meeting at an embassy there as he pursued a complaint against MI5.

The paper said:

Jurors at the Old Bailey took less than an hour to find Joseph not guilty by reason of insanity after a week-long trial.

Joseph is being held indefinitely under:

under sections 37 and 41 of the Mental Health Act at a disposal hearing at the Old Bailey.

The accused made a range of claims against MI5:

about racist treatment and “highly disturbing” claims, including rape, child abuse, and torture, jurors were told.

The National reported that these claims were “unfounded”.

Closed door trials

The judge ordered the trial to be held behind closed doors:

in the absence of the public and press to “avoid the risk of damage to national security”.

The National reported:

Before the jury were invited to retire to consider their verdicts, they were told that experts agreed the defendant was in the grip of mental illness to the extent that Joseph did not think he was doing anything wrong.

The details of the case that have emerged into the public domain are remarkable:

Joseph also claimed a swastika had been put up in the office and he was injected with a hypodermic needle containing something that made him “very poorly” while at Thames House, MI5’s headquarters.

He made contact with the foreign state in 2024 after a bid to bring a private prosecution for assault in 2019 was rejected.

Joseph also applied to the High Court for a judicial review

and began copying an email linked to the foreign state in to his communications.

The court heard that Joseph flew to Latvia in 2024 and attempted to contact a foreign embassy there. He was arrested on his return to Gatwick and refused to give up his passwords saying he was an MI5 officer.

On January 13 2025, Joseph copied in a foreign state in another email complaining about his treatment by police at Gatwick Airport.

On his arrest at an Ibis Hotel on January 30 2025, he maintained he was an “armed MI5 officer” and a lock knife was found in his pocket.

A search of his home later turned up:

a homemade card falsely identify him as an MI5 officer.

He also claimed in a police interview to be an MI5 spy and protested his innocence while claiming to have passed a lie detector test.

At one point, Joseph claimed to be:

a black belt in taekwondo with training in ninja-style knife and sword techniques at Thames House and was allowed to carry a blade for “defence”.

The court acquitted Joseph of all charges on grounds of “insanity”. He will remain in Broadmoor hospital indefinitely. He was arrested in 2022 on similar charges.

The Brits increasingly use secretive trials. As the Justice Gap reported in 2020, the practice of Closed Material Proceedings:

may relate to minutes of discussions between government officials and the security services. Often, it pertains to sensitive or classified intelligence information/evidence gathered and relied on by the security services (MI5, MI6, GCHQ).

Adding

Intelligence has naturally evolved over the years as technology has advanced, but it might include: human sources, intercepted communications, surveillance techniques, or location intelligence.

Joseph reportedly worked in IT in various roles over a decade.

MI5 was recently found to have lied in court in a separate case involving a machete-wielding Neo-Nazi agent who fantasised about eating children. MI5 compensated one of his victims. The service eventually apologised, but only after their wrongdoing was exposed.

Featured image via the Canary

By Joe Glenton

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