Mr. Aimé Kilolo Musamba

Bemba was represented in this Main Case at the ICC by Aimé Kilolo Musamba (Kilolo), a lawyer from DRC, who is also a French speaking member of the Brussels Bar.

In November of 2013, Mr. Kilolo and three other members of the Bemba defense team were arrested. Bemba was already in custody on the main case. Mr. Kilolo remained in custody in The Hague, seat of the ICC, for the next 11 months. Kilolo and the others were charged a few weeks later with offences against the administration of justice. Essentially, this case was about witness and evidence tampering.

Trial commenced in September of 2015 and concluded the following May. The judgment convicting all five accused was delivered in October 2016. Mr. Kilolo, specifically, was convicted of corruptly influencing witnesses, presenting false evidence and inducing false testimony.

At this point, Mr. Kilolo requested and received the appointment of Michael G. Karnavas as his counsel for sentencing and any potential appeal. Karnavas is a longtime friend and colleague of Popper & Yatvin partner, Alan L. Yatvin.

The two met while teaching trial advocacy at the Cardozo School of Law in New York in the late 1980’s, when Yatvin was a Philadelphia Defender and Karnavas was an Alaska Public Defender.

Michael G. Karnavas

(( Karnavas has since gone on to develop an international criminal law practice, and is considered one of the preeminent defense lawyers in the field)) In putting together the Kilolo defense team, Karnavas invited Yatvin aboard to serve as Senior Legal Consultant. Karnavas believed that Yatvin’s experience as an active and experienced trial and appellate lawyer, as well as his experience representing lawyers on matters related to ethics and professional responsibility, coupled with his international criminal law experience at the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague, and the so-called Khmer Rouge Tribunal (Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia) in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, made him a valuable addition to the team.

Alan L. Yatvin argues before the ICTY in 2006

Sentencing was briefed and argued, and the judgment of sentence was delivered on March 22, 2017. Mr. Kilolo was sentenced to two and one-half years of imprisonment, with credit for time served and the remaining period of imprisonment suspended. He was also ordered to pay a fine of 30,000 Euros.

The Prosecutor appealed all the sentences, while the co-accused appealed their convictions. Mr. Kilolo did not appeal.

After extensive briefing, the ICC Appeals Chamber issued its judgment in March of 2018, finding that there was no authority for suspending sentence under the ICC’s legal framework and reversing certain of the grounds on which the sentences were based, but vacating one-third of the convictions. The matter was then remanded to the Trial Chamber for resentencing.

The Kilolo defense team briefed the issues on resentencing and prepared for oral argument on re-sentencing.

Then, on June 8, 2018, after a 10-year odyssey of proceedings in the main case, hundreds of submissions (oral and written), roughly 48 months of trial, 77 witnesses, 733 admitted items of evidence, 1219 written trial decisions and orders, and at the expense of an incredible amount of human and financial resources, Bemba was acquitted by the ICC Appeals Chamber of all charges. Simply put, the basis of the acquittal was grounded in the Prosecutor’s failures in charging and presentation of evidence.((Responding to the many critics on the soundness of the appeal judgement, Karnavas posted an analysis of it on his blog)) The ICC Prosecutor, Madam Fatou Bensouda, responded with a public statement, criticizing the Majority for departing “from the traditional model of appellate review of factual errors,” replacing it “with new, uncertain and untested standards,” and for departing “from the Appeals Chamber’s previous jurisprudence, as well as international practice, in relation to the manner in which the Prosecution ought to charge cases involving mass criminality.” The criticism by the Prosecutor was rejected by the President of the Court, who reminded the Prosecutor that:

It will continue to be the case that all judgments and decisions by the judges of the Court are taken in accordance with the fundamental principle of judicial independence, consistently with the solemn undertaking of each judge to perform his or her duties ‘honorably, faithfully, impartially and conscientiously’… When judges acquit or convict, it is because those core principles direct them to do so. And it is hoped that it is consideration of those core principles that should guide any post-judgment statements by a party or participant in the case – be it the Prosecutor, the Defence or Counsel for Victims

In a further attempt to blunt the criticism of the Prosecution in the Main Case, on the eve of the scheduled sentencing hearing, the Prosecutor made submissions in support of resentencing asserting that Bemba’s acquittal by the Appeals Chamber was a result of the witness tampering conduct. The re-sentencing hearing was held on July 4, 2018, after which Mr. Kilolo and the other convicted persons were given leave to respond to the Prosecutor’s submission.

On September 17, 2018, the Trial Chamber issued its judgment of sentence. Immediately following the re-sentencing judgment, Mr. Karnavas described how gratified he was by the sentencing judgment:

As I sat there listening to the presiding judge read a summary of the judgment, I was surprised and pleased to hear the chamber adopting many of the arguments we had made on key issues in our briefs and at oral argument.

Specifically, the Trial Chamber completely rejected the Prosecutor’s argument that Bemba\’s acquittal by the appeals chamber in the main case was a result of the witness tampering conduct, stating that the acquittal of Bemba in the main case appeal “has no impact on the sentences to be imposed” and that the “Prosecution manifestly fails to establish any causation between what the Three Convicted Persons were convicted of and the outcome of the Main Case…”¹. Additionally:

The Chamber is not persuaded by the Prosecution’s arguments to the extent that, now that the suspended sentences are not possible, none of the considerations justifying them have any further merit. The Chamber based its decision to suspend sentences on Mr Kilolo and Mr Mangenda’s individual circumstances – their personal circumstances, good behaviour throughout the proceedings, and the consequences of incarceration on their families/professional life. There is no indication that any of these individual circumstances no longer apply. The Kilolo and Mangenda Defence instead offer further proof bolstering the Chamber’s original findings.((Re-Sentencing Judgment, ¶¶ 51)).

The Trial Chamber also rejected the Prosecutor’s argument that the reversal of convictions on 14 of the charges should have no effect on the sentences because the conduct overlaps. The Trial Chamber explained:

The Chamber did not mechanistically conclude that the overlapping conduct led to the Article 70(1)(b) convictions having no impact on the joint sentence. Every conviction mattered in the Chamber’s individualised determinations.

Accordingly, the Trial Chamber found that because it had considered the cumulative effect of the convictions in imposing the original sentence, it was required to accord some weight to the fact that 14 of those convictions have been reversed.

Finally, the Trial Chamber considered the fact that even though the suspended period of incarceration no longer had any legal effect, the fact that Mr. Kilolo had been on de facto probation and had abided by all the terms of his suspended sentence, and behaved constructively and cooperatively. These, the Trial Chamber concluded required consideration as part of Mr. Kilolo’s individual circumstances, an essential element of sentencing under ICC law.

As a result, Mr. Kilolo was sentenced to the 11 months incarceration he had already served, and the same fine imposed in 2017. Time served sentences and the same fines were also imposed on the others.

The Prosecutor has 30 days from the date of the sentencing judgment to decide whether to appeal, but for now, the core rationale of the original sentence is preserved, while Mr. Kilolo, who has paid the debt for his conduct not just through incarceration, but in many other financial, personal and professional ways, is free to move on with his life.

In commenting on Yatvin’s contributions to the appeal and resentencing, Karnavas stated:

Alan is a lawyer’s lawyer. His work in testing our assumptions, insisting on clarity in our prose, and adding punch to our arguments, was an invaluable element of our success in obtaining and preserving an appropriate sentence for Mr. Kilolo.

Update 21 October 2018:  The Office of the Prosecutor allowed the deadline to pass without filing an appeal of Mr. Kilolo’s sentence.

1. Re-Sentencing Judgment, ¶¶ 22, 25

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Winter Landscape with Skaters by Hendrick Avercamp

With images of Hendrick Avercamp’s impish 17th century paintings and childhood memories of Hans Brinker, or the Silver Skates (book and movie) dancing in my head, I set out for the “centrum” to fill the last afternoon of my vacation.  However, that snowy, frozen canal climate is long gone from this country.  Unused to so much snow in a short period of time the Dutch city was, if not paralyzed, substantially slowed down.

After wandering around mostly deserted streets, I headed for the oh-so-convenient bus whose route dropped me practically at the door of the home of my friend Michael Karnavas, where I was staying.  Over the next hour, it finally dawned on me that despite the illuminated boards assuring that the bus was 9 minutes, then 4 minutes, then 1 minute away, before disappearing from the board altogether, the buses had ceased running.  So, I caught the tram to the beach, which I knew stopped behind the building housing the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) a 10 minute walk from my lodgings.

As I walked back, I stopped by the Churchillplein fountain, in front of the Tribunal, to reminisce and contemplate its impending closing.

Much has been said and written about the legacy of the ICTY as it prepared to end its run at the close of 2017, not the least of which have been the waves of self-praise and a carefully choreographed farewell tour.  As an observer since 2004, with an 18 month stint as counsel for an accused in 2006-2007, I have my own less praising opinions of the ICTY’s legacy:

• I believe the stubborn refusal to meaningfully revisit and refine or reverse some of its early jurisprudence has left a legacy with dubious legal precedent.
• I believe the ceaseless, shameless, publicity seeking actions of tribunal leadership, including Tribunal presidents who sit as appeals judges, in promoting prosecution in the former Yugoslavia, defining historical truth and participating in commemorative events, taints claims of fairness and impartiality.  Not to mention the untold millions spent on these unseemly public relations activities.
• I believe the excessive attention to confidentiality, leading to mountains of confidential or redacted filings and decisions, not to mention all too often closed proceedings, undercut claims to transparent justice and undermined the credibility of the ICTY.
• I believe the inequitable allocation of resources, personnel and time to the defense of these cases needlessly undermined confidence in the system and denied many accused due process.
• I believe the failure to control the scope of the prosecutions led to trials that were too long and so unmanageable as to be incapable of rendering justice.  Just look at Prlić et al. (IT-04-74) — nearly a decade and a half from indictment to appeal judgment.
• I believe the over-selection of judges with experience confined to academia or the diplomatic corps – without trial experience as either a judge or a lawyer – has led to uneven trials and impractical decision-making.
• Finally, I believe the structure of the institution, with the prosecutor inside the tent, has exacerbated both the perception and the reality of the ICTY as an institution more concerned with convictions and finding so-called historical truths, than with insuring fair trials and protecting the rights of the accused individuals.

Perhaps I am being too harsh.  After all, as the first international criminal tribunal since the post-World War II Nuremberg and Tokyo International Military Tribunals, there was a lot of new ground to be trod.  But the ICTY has already missed no opportunity to trumpet its own accomplishments, large, small or imagined.  While I, to paraphrase Shakespeare’s Marc Antony, come to bury the ICTY, not to praise it.¹

As I contemplated the Tribunal, I recalled that even the “closing” was illusory.  I thought to myself that it was kind of like Pizza Hut (a childhood favorite of my son Jeremy), whose large sit-down restaurants have closed, but which still functions in joint locations with Taco Bell,² with the same advertising, some of the same staff and the same uninspiring pizzas.

You see, the ICTY is not really ending, it is simply folding into a successor entity with the nondescript and non-descriptive name of Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals (MICT), whose unfortunate acronym always makes me think it an ironic abbreviation of micturate.  The MICT has been in place since 2010, operating in parallel to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), taking over all its functions in January 2016.  Starting with a 2016 cut-off, the MICT has also begun handling trials, appeals and other matters for the ICTY.  Staff, judges and prosecutors that have been wearing two hats for a few years, will now be solely under the MICT.  Except for downsizing and routine turnover, many of the faces will remain the same.  Indeed, the President of the MICT is a four-term president of the ICTY, who held both presidencies from 2013-2016.  The Prosecutor is simply changing his letterhead.  Even the building I contemplated in the snow will remain The Hague seat of the MICT for the foreseeable future.

Unfortunately, few of the mistakes of the ICTY were corrected in designing the MICT.  Not surprising with so many of the same faces in planning and decision making.  The one area where there had been some hope for change was in the allocation of resources for post-conviction review to address after-discovered evidence and ineffectiveness of counsel claims, and for assistance of counsel relating to conditions of incarceration for this aging population of convicted persons. While the budget for self-congratulatory activities and inapt community outreach seems likely to remain robust, the funding for investigating and developing post-conviction claims still runs the gamut from non-existent to laughably parsimonious. A disappointing, but not unexpected failure.

Stopping to take a picture of the Tribunal, one small speck of light felt positive.  Just to right of the entrance-way is the office of the Association of Defense Counsel at the International Criminal Tribunals (ADC-ICT), formerly ADC-ICTY.  The ADC is unique in the world of international(ized) criminal tribunals.  It is not an organ of the ICTY, like the Defence Office of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, or an office of the registry, like the International Criminal Court’s Office of Public Counsel for the Defence. Instead, it is an independent entity managed and financed by its lawyer members.  However, the ADC is recognized by the ICTY and MICT.   Membership in the ADC is a requirement for appointment to the list of counsel at the ICTY/MICT. It is provided office space in the Tribunal, organizes internships, manages the common spaces and equipment allocated to the defense by the ICTY/MICT, and in recent years the Registrar of the Tribunal has involved the ADC in Tribunal‑wide committees and projects.  The Registrar also consults with the ADC on major policies affecting the work of defense teams.  Though hardly a seat at the table, the formal recognition of an association of defense counsel, and a tradition of consultation, is invaluable in giving voice to the accused, through their counsel, on matters which though outside of the courtroom, affect what happens inside in many ways.  The other international(ized) courts would do well to adopt this model.

As I turned from the Tribunal building to peer through the falling snow toward the rows of international flags flapping in the median, I found that I was neither inspired nor saddened by the realization that the ICTY, as such, would soon end.  As a lawyer, practicing at the ICTY was an interesting experience.  But in the end the ICTY is too flawed to merit the historical revision and uncritical praise it is receiving.  Maybe as the baton is passed, the MICT will find a path to greater credibility and fairness, before it too rides off into the sunset.  But for now, with the same people, predilections and policies, the possibility of a different result seems remote.  A golden opportunity micturated away.

Subsequent to the publication of this essay, the MICT changed its name to the  International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT). I do not presume to take credit for the name change, but …

1. Compare the more diplomatic review by Michael Karnavas. ↩︎
2. Completely unrelated, I then thought about Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell a song by Satirical Hip-Hop group Das Racist. ↩︎

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Informal Opinion: Representing ‘Those People’ Achieves Justice

By Alan L. Yatvin

“How can you represent those people?” In three decades as a criminal defense attorney, I had heard that question many times — at cocktail parties and from prosecutors, police, victims, law students, and once even from a judge. It comes with the territory. I understand that people accused of crimes are often automatically condemned, while their lawyers are regarded with contempt. However, as I walked along that steamy January afternoon, I was shocked by the source of the question. This time it was my wife, Laura, prompted by a just completed hour-long audio tour of a former fruit orchard on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

We were at Choeung Ek, the most infamous of the killing fields of the Khmer Rouge. It was there that Pol Pot’s regime executed 20,000 people. The victims were those suspected of connections with the former government or foreign governments, as well as professionals and intellectuals, members of various Cambodian ethnic groups and, in a cannibalistic frenzy, even regime members accused of some act of disloyalty. The Khmer Rouge death toll from starvation, sickness and execution has been estimated at two million. At Choeung Ek, men, women and infants were slaughtered night after night as martial music blared to cover their cries, and then they were buried in mass graves.

Initially, Laura had not wanted to go to the killing fields. We were on vacation in Southeast Asia, there were many beautiful and exotic places to see, and she knew the story of the horrors of this chapter of Cambodian history. But as we were planning our trip, a friend said, “You have to go. It would be like going to Israel and not going to the Holocaust Memorial at Yad Vashem, or skipping the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam.” I insisted that the visit was necessary to understanding Cambodia and its people today.

Yatvin takes Bar oath before the Appeal Chamber of the Court of Cambodia

This was actually my second visit to these killing fields. I had been there 18 months earlier while in Phnom Penh on business. Along with my work as a Philadelphia criminal defense lawyer, first as a public defender and then in private practice, that visit was part of the reason for Laura’s surprise question. I had been in Cambodia as appointed interim counsel for a suspect before the Extraordinary Chamber of the Court of Cambodia (ECCC), also known as the Khmer Rouge tribunal. My elderly client was a former military officer.

That was not my first war crimes case. In 2006-2007 I spent 18 months flying between Philadelphia and The Hague, where I represented an accused Bosnian Serb before the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY). The ICTY prosecutor had described my client as being perhaps the person most individually responsible for killings in the entire Bosnia conflict. He changed counsel before trial, where he was convicted and sentenced to life in prison.

Thus, this was no stranger at a party expressing shock and distaste for my profession. This was someone who well knew the nature of my work and had lived with it, and me, for decades. Since we were just beginning our three-week vacation in Cambodia and Laos, we had plenty of time to discuss the matter.

Criminal defense is a significant, but not exclusive, part of my practice, which also includes representing victims of police misconduct and children with disabilities. The reality of my core criminal defense practice is that some of my clients have committed a crime. Yet all too often they have been charged with crimes disproportionate to their conduct, their prosecution has been procured by illegal or unconstitutional police conduct, or overzealous prosecutors are seeking excessive or inappropriate punishment. Sometimes my clients are just plain innocent. Often, I have no idea whether they committed a crime.

But what I think about my client or the charges does not matter. I am not the jury who decides guilt, nor am I the judge who applies the law or determines punishment. My job is to do everything in my power to make sure that at the end of the process, my client has been treated fairly, the prosecution has been put to its burden of proof and the law has been followed. International criminal law expert Michael G. Karnavas has said: “The results at the end of the trial will be meaningless unless a robust defense is afforded to the accused.”

Meeting with Roosevelt and Stalin in Yalta in 1945, Winston Churchill urged summary execution of selected Nazi leaders and imprisonment of others without trial. This was rejected in favor of the first international war crimes tribunal. In his opening statement the lead Nuremberg prosecutor, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson, told the judges: “Despite the fact that public opinion already condemns their acts, we agree that here they must be given a presumption of innocence, and we accept the burden of proving criminal acts and the responsibility of these defendants for their commission.”

I represent “those people” because all people must be ably represented by lawyers who do not judge them or decide their guilt based on their own views; otherwise there is no justice. The hushed courtrooms of the federal courthouse across from Philadelphia’s Independence Hall and the high-tech courtrooms of The Hague’s tribunals are a world away from Cambodia’s killing fields. But it would be a betrayal of the memory of those buried in that now peaceful orchard to allow a legal system, a government, or the mob to decide in advance that some are so guilty that they are unworthy of the legal protections and representation those victims were denied.

Pol Pot supposedly said: “Better to arrest 10 innocent people by mistake than free a single guilty party.” My mandate as a criminal defense lawyer is precisely the opposite, as expressed in this statement attributed in various forms to Voltaire, Benjamin Franklin, and Sir William Blackstone: “It is better that 10 guilty persons escape, than that one innocent suffer.” My wife, at least, now understands why I represent those people, even in Cambodia.

About the Author

Before entering private practice, Alan Yatvin served as an Assistant Philadelphia and Federal Defender. He concentrates his practice in criminal defense in state and federal courts, police misconduct litigation, and representation of special needs students. He is a director of the American Diabetes Association.

© 2017, National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers™ (NACDL®), All Rights Reserved.

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Mr. Kilolo, a national of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and a member of the Belgian Bar, was convicted of various offences against the administration of justice, relating to the false testimonies of defence witnesses, during his service as defence counsel in the case The Prosecutor v. Jean-Pierre Bemba Gombo.

Mr. Kilolo’s Defence team on appeal is lead by experienced international criminal defence counsel Michael G. Karnavas. Yatvin stated: “I have known Michael for decades. He is beyond doubt one of the world’s top practitioners in the field of international criminal law. I am honored to have been asked to consult with him.”

Yatvin continued: “This prosecution implicated important issues of prosecutorial overreach, conflict and invasion of privilege, interpretation of so-called western legal processes through different cultural norms and traditions, the scope of counsel’s liability for the acts of others, and the nature of assumptions regarding witness credibility and motivations.”

In summary, the appeal focuses on three basic grounds: illegally obtained evidence and its fruits; evidence protected by privilege and privacy rights; and sufficiency of the evidence to support the conviction.

Yatvin, who has practiced criminal defence for 34 years, previously served as lead counsel for an accused at the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in pre-trial and on appeal, and as interim foreign co-lawyer for a suspect at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC).

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INTERNATIONAL DEFENSE

By Richard G. Freeman

Our world – from Filbert Street courthouse to Market Street courthouse, perhaps interspersed with a bold junket to West Chester – is too small for Alan Yatvin. Somehow this protean practitioner has balanced his role as a partner in the firm of Popper & Yatvin with meaningful appearances as defense counsel in the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) at The Hague, representing defendants accused of crimes in the former Yugoslavia. For good measure Yatvin chairs the court’s Association of Defense Counsel Membership Committee. And last spring the globetrotting Yatvin was sworn in as a member of the Bar Association of the Kingdom of Cambodia, joining the list of international counsel at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Court of Cambodia (ECCC).  Click here to read the full article.

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Program attendees included ADC-ICTY members, interns and staff, as well as defence team members from the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL), staff of the ICTY/ICTR/MICT Registry, Prosecution and Chambers, and students from various universities around The Hague.

At the ADC’s General Assembly on November 9th, Alan was elected to his 5th term as chair of the ADC-ICTY Membership Committee.

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The Prosecutor sought re-transfer of Lukic and his cousin to the jurisdiction of the national courts in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) pursuant to Rule 11bis.  Lukic had been convicted in absentia in Serbia, and he was quite notorious in BiH, so transfer from the security of the United Nations Detention Unit to a jail in BiH might well have resulted in his death.

Although I initially lost my challenge to the transfer before the Referral Bench, I prevailed on appeal and the order to transfer Lukic was reversed by the Appeals Chamber on 20 July 2007.  This is the only time an ICTY lower court decision to transfer an accused to a national jurisdiction under Rule 11bis has been reversed on appeal.  The winning argument was that as the only alleged leader of a regional militia being prosecuted by the ICTY (another militia leader had died before trial), Lukic fit squarely within the U.N. Security Council mandate describing those who should be tried before the ICTY.  In other words, if the direction is to try the most significant in each category, and there is only one in a category, then he must be deemed the most significant.  Click here to see my appeals brief.

Ironically, after I achieved the result he sought – trial at the ICTY – Lukic requested new counsel.  The Registrar’s public recitation of my rollercoaster ride with this difficult client is an interesting read.  (Click here).  Proceedings were further delayed when my successor was relieved before trial.  New counsel finally took the case to trial. Lukic was convicted in 2009. An appeal followed and the judgment is being issued in open court on Tuesday, 4 December 2012.  It would have been interesting to sit in on this final act, even from behind the glass in the gallery.

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This will likely be the last meeting of the ADC-ICTY in this precise form, as the Yugoslavia Tribunal (ICTY) in it\’s current form will cease to exist in July of 2013.  At that point the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals (MICT), also known as the Residual Mechanism, will take over certain functions of the ICTY.  The MICT, created by the U.N. in late 2010, has already assumed some of the functions of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) effective July 2012. The MICT will be responsible for new cases, including contempt proceedings, re-trials, new appeals, post-judgment matters, incarceration and release decisions, and certain other functions previously performed by the tribunals.  Until the completion of pending trials and appeals, the existing tribunals will exist in tandem with the MICT.

Under Rule 42(A)(iii) of the Rules of Procedure and Evidence for the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals, the judges have adopted the requirement that all counsel appearing before the Residual Mechanism be a member of an association which is recognised by the Registrar. The Registrar has requested that an association of counsel be established for the Residual Mechanism.  To this end, the ADC-ICTY has convened a working committee to consider proposals.  Any plan needs to address both the needs of the MICT as well as the ongoing ICTY obligations.

The biggest hurdle will be making the Registrar and the MICT President understand, that because of the lowered volume of work for defense counsel, both in number of counsel and amount per counsel, that the MICT must expect to contribute to the funding of such an association. There simply will not be enough members able or willing to contribute sufficient funds to support even a minimal infrastructure for such an association, without MICT financial support. Having decided that such an association is of value to the MICT and having memorialized that need in the rules, the MICT must also expect to shoulder some of the cost of insuring that such association is a legitimate, at least minimally functioning entity. As the MICT obviously realized, an ADC serves the MICT by providing additional/complimentary applicant screening, an organized point of communication with defense counsel, self-policing and disciplinary mechanisms, management of essential MICT resources allocated to the defense, professional education, coordination and training of interns, and many other tasks essential to the operation of even a scaled down institution like the MICT.

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