London Lawyer to Defend Taylor in War Crimes Trial

RAPAPORT… Lawyer Courtenay Griffiths of London was appointed to lead Charles Taylor’s defense against 11 counts of war crimes. Taylor awaits the start of his trial on August 20 at The Hague after pleading not guilty to the charges involved in Sierra Leone’s civil war. 

Taylor’s lawyer will be paid from the court-approved monthly $100,000 award for legal fees, living expenses, and an investigator. 

Griffiths is a native of Jamaica, but was raised in England. He has worked on high-profile cases in the past including the 1984 hotel bombing by the Irish Republican Army in Brighton, (where then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was sleeping,) and  the 1983 bombing at Harrod’s in London.