About
A free weekly collection of criminal law links - for practitioners, law students, and anyone with an interest in the criminal justice system of England and Wales.
Curated by Sam Willis, a barrister at 5 King's Bench Walk.
News
Mobile Phone Consent Forms
Consent forms asking for permission to access information including emails, messages and photographs have been rolled out in England and Wales. It comes after a number of rape and serious sexual assault cases collapsed when crucial evidence emerged.
Victim Support said the move could stop victims coming forward. But police and prosecutors say the forms can plug a gap in the law which says complainants and witnesses cannot be forced to disclose relevant content from phones, laptops, tablets or smart watches. Director of Public Prosecutions Max Hill said such digital information would only be looked at where it forms a "reasonable" line of inquiry, with material going before a court only if it meets stringent rules.
The policy has been heavily criticised e.g. here, here and here.
The CPS response is here and an interesting blog post on the issue is here.
'Man pours acid on himself in London court'
A defendant in court was critically injured when he doused himself with a noxious substance while in the dock.
According to the BBC, the defendant, Marc Marshall, 54, had just been sentenced for fraud offences when the incident happened. Marshall was reported to have been carrying a metal water bottle, and CCTV footage was said to have shown him sipping from it as he went through security.
2019 Revised Magistrates’ Court Protocol for the Greater London area
Agreement has been reached between the Bar and the London Criminal Courts Solicitors’ Association (LCCSA) over a revised Magistrates' Court Protocol for the Greater London area, which is being published today and can be found here.
It sets out the obligations upon a solicitor when instructing a barrister in a Magistrates’ Court case in the Greater London area, and the corresponding obligations on the barrister undertaking the hearing. It provides minimum fees for the Greater London Area, which is the region we understood from our research paid the lowest rates. The Protocol also deals with timely payment of fees.
Cases
Sentencing in R v Julian Assange (Bail Act offence)
Julian Assange, on 11 April 2019 you were convicted at Westminster Magistrates Court of an offence under s.6(1) of the Bail Act 1976, and committed to this court for sentence.
It is difficult to envisage a more serious example of this offence. The maximum sentence for this offence is 12 months. You do not have the benefit of a plea of guilty. You have made a written apology today, the first recognition that you regret you actions. In my judgment, the seriousness of your offence, having taken into account the mitigation merits a sentence near the maximum. The sentence is imprisonment for 50 weeks.
International
'An algorithm wipes clean the criminal pasts of thousands'
This month, a judge in California cleared thousands of criminal records with one stroke of his pen. He did it thanks to a ground-breaking new algorithm that reduces a process that took months to mere minutes.
Piero Salazar is sitting at a wooden table, swamped by paperwork. His anxious family looks on. He’s one of around 50 or so people who have come to this community centre in San Fernando, near Los Angeles, to take part in an “expungement clinic” - a free service for those looking to get their criminal records removed or reduced.
The group had made Clear My Record, a tool that can analyse text in court files, using character recognition to decipher scanned documents. It discards any record involving a violent crime, as such records do not qualify. For those that remain, the tool automatically fills out the necessary paperwork. In other words, the algorithm replaced the process being done manually at the expungement clinics.
Other
'The learning curve: DPP Max Hill QC'
Learning from its mistakes, disclosure is now ‘front and centre’ at the CPS and case file quality paramount, says the new DPP. Four months in, he has clear goals for the service while boosting internal morale and public trust
Sponsored
Crime Fees 3 - Crown Court Fees Calculator for iOS and Android
Crime Fees enables criminal barristers in England and Wales to easily calculate Crown Court advocate fees for both prosecution and defence. All fee schemes are covered: the CPS Scheme C, the new December 2018 AGFS (Scheme 11), the April 2018 AGFS (Scheme 10), and the old 2012 AGFS (Scheme 9).