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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
The King's Speech 2024
My Government will seek to strengthen the border and make streets safer. A Bill will be introduced to modernise the asylum and immigration system, establishing a new Border Security Command and delivering enhanced counter terror powers to tackle organised immigration crime [Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill]. Legislation will be brought forward to strengthen community policing, give the police greater powers to deal with anti social behaviour and strengthen support for victims [Crime and Policing Bill, Victims, Courts and Public Protection Bill]. Measures will be introduced to improve the safety and security of public venues and help keep the British public safe from terrorism [Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill]. My Government will bring forward plans to halve violence against women and girls...
The King's Speech 2024: background briefing notes
... crackdown on anti social behaviour. Introduce new Respect Orders to tackle persistent adult offenders, fast-track Public Spaces Protection Orders to make it quicker and easier to clamp down on rapid escalations in street drinking, and new powers to tackle the dangerous and anti social use of off-road bikes. Create a duty for local partners to co-operate to tackle anti social behaviour, with an anti social behaviour lead in every local authority area.
tackle retail crime. Create a new specific offence of assaulting a shopworker and introduce stronger measures to tackle low level shoplifting...
tackle knife crime. Get dangerous knives and other weapons off our streets by banning ninja swords and other lethal blades, and introducing strict sanctions on senior executives of online companies who fail to operate within the law. Prevent young people being drawn into crime and criminal gangs by strengthening the law to tackle those who exploit children for criminal purposes, and create arrangements for local Young Futures prevention partnerships to bring together services to support at-risk teenagers.
provide a stronger, specialist response to violence against women and girls. Ensure the police have the capability to respond robustly to domestic abuse, rape and other sexual offences, and strengthen the law to improve the police response to spiking...
require offenders to attend their sentencing hearings so that victims and bereaved family members of deceased victims see criminals face the consequences of their actions.
protect the public from sex offenders, restricting parental responsibility for child sex offenders and implementing restrictions on sex offenders changing their names.
reduce delays in the courts system by allowing Associate Prosecutors to work on appropriate cases.
In addition to the Bill, we will deliver on our manifesto commitment to fast-track rape cases, with specialist courts at every Crown Court.
Andrew Malkinson Review
A man who was wrongly convicted of rape and jailed for 17 years could have been exonerated almost a decade earlier if not for serious failings by officials, a review has found. Andrew Malkinson, 57, was jailed for life in 2004 and had twice been refused an appeal after applying for his case to be reviewed by the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) – the body responsible for investigating alleged miscarriages of justice.
His conviction was quashed in July 2023 after years spent protesting his innocence, and an official review has now laid bare a string of “serious” failings and missed chances to correct the miscarriage of justice from as early as 2009...
Chris Henley KC, who was drafted in by the CCRC to carry out the review, uncovered a series of “serious” failings which prevented Mr Malkinson from being freed earlier, including revealing the body had even considered rejecting requests for a referral to the Court of Appeal for a third time. Making nine recommendations for improvement in his report, published on Thursday, he said: “The CCRC failed him. It required Appeal to obtain the new DNA evidence that ultimately resulted in further work that led to the referral by the CCRC. It would not have happened otherwise. “The opportunity to have this case referred in 2009 was missed, and a further opportunity to look again at the DNA evidence when the second application was received in 2018 was not taken.” Referring to Appeal’s later requests to re-test samples in 2019, he said: “I have seen nothing to persuade me that the CCRC would have independently considered that retesting was justified or had any prospect of producing anything new which might call into question the safety of the conviction.”
The full report can be read here.
'CCRC chair rejects minister’s call to resign over Andrew Malkinson case'
The chair of the Criminal Cases Review Commission has rejected calls from the justice secretary to resign after a report on its handling of the Andrew Malkinson case laid bare “a catalogue of failures”. A review by Chris Henley KC found that Malkinson, who spent 17 years in jail for a 2003 stranger rape he did not commit, could have been exonerated almost a decade earlier. It also contained personal criticism of the watchdog’s chair, Helen Pitcher, for failing to apologise and for “taking too little responsibility”.
The new justice secretary, Shabana Mahmood, said Pitcher was “unfit to fulfil her duties” and that she was seeking her removal in light of the findings. It is understood that she made her position clear to Pitcher on Thursday morning in the hope that she would resign. But Pitcher said she was the “best person” for the job and that she had no intention of standing down. She also said that with hindsight she would have apologised sooner, and that the CCRC had told her not to. Pitcher said: “I have been credited by the MoJ for substantially turning the CCRC round … I honestly believe I am the best person to take this forward for as long as I have the opportunity to do so.” Because the CCRC is an independent body, unless Pitcher resigns she can only be removed from her post by the king, acting on the recommendations of a panel. This will now be convened...
'Five Just Stop Oil activists receive record sentences for planning to block M25'
Five supporters of the Just Stop Oil climate campaign who conspired to cause gridlock on London’s orbital motorway have been sentenced to lengthy jail terms by a judge who told them they had “crossed the line from concerned campaigner to fanatic”. Roger Hallam, Daniel Shaw, Louise Lancaster, Lucia Whittaker De Abreu and Cressida Gethin were found guilty last week of conspiracy to cause a public nuisance for coordinating direct action protests on the M25 over four days in November 2022. Hallam received a five-year sentence on Thursday, while the other four were each sentenced to four years.
The sentences are thought to be the longest sentences ever given in the UK for non-violent protest, exceeding those given to the Just Stop Oil protesters Morgan Trowland (three years) and Marcus Decker (two years and seven months) for scaling the Dartford Crossing...
'Feltham Young Offenders' Institute is most violent - watchdog'
A young offenders' institution in west London has the highest levels of violence of any prison in England and Wales, an inspection has found. HMP Feltham A, which holds children aged between 15 and 18 who are on remand or have been convicted, has seen incidents of disorder triple since the last inspection of the prison two years ago. The review, by HM Inspectorate of Prisons in March, found that conditions had significantly deteriorated and self-harm and levels of violence were on the rise. it concluded "there had been a deterioration in standards with levels of violence now the highest of any prison in the country". The Ministry of Justice said although changes were being made, "we know there is much more to do". There are about 80 children in the centre, with more than 260 different instructions to prevent children from mixing...
Cases
R v Goldsmith [2024] EWCA Crim 780
The question in this appeal is whether, in a trial of fact conducted under section 4A of the Criminal Procedure (Insanity) Act 1964, as amended ('the 1964 Act'), relating to an offence of possession with intent to supply a controlled drug contrary to section 5(3) of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 ('the 1971 Act'), a jury is obliged to consider only whether the defendant was in possession of the drugs in question, or whether it must also consider whether the defendant intended to supply them. The answer to that question will turn on whether the latter element forms part of the act charged against the defendant as the offence...
... In summary, for the purposes of an enquiry under section 4A of the 1964 Act concerned with an offence contrary to section 5(3) of the 1971 Act, the injurious act in question is the possession of something which is in fact a controlled drug. It is that act to which the jury's enquiry must be directed. Per Antoine, no enquiry into the defendant's intent is permitted, as the Recorder ruled in this case, directing the jury accordingly...
R v Hallam and Others - Sentencing Remarks
I have to sentence all 5 of you for the offence of conspiracy intentionally to cause a public nuisance, of which you were each convicted by the jury following a trial which concluded a week ago. The conspiracy in question involved a sophisticated plan to disrupt traffic on the M25 motorway by means of protesters climbing up the gantries over the motorway. And the conspiracy bore fruit. There was disruption on the M25 on four successive days, from 7-10 November 2022. Over 45 protesters climbed or attempted to climb up gantries at various points on the M25. Every sector of this orbital motorway was affected...
At trial the jury heard evidence quantifying the huge disruption caused. The total road impact time over the four days was 121 hours and 45 minutes. The total extent of delay to road users is calculated at 50,856 hours and the number of affected vehicles at 708, 523. The total economic cost of the four days of disruption is put at £769,966. Cost incurred by the Metropolitan Police alone [five other forces were involved, given the geography of the M25] was over £1 million. And the jury heard evidence of the impact of the protests on ordinary members of the public, who were travelling on the M25 on the days in question and became caught up in the disruption. That included evidence about People who missed flights, People who missed funerals, School students delayed for their mock exams; A child with special needs on his way to school who missed part of the school day and his medication which placed the taxi driver driving him there at risk, as the child could become volatile without his medication; Other school students with special educational needs being delayed on their way to school. Somebody suffering an aggressive form of cancer, who missed an appointment at a cancer clinic and had to wait 2 months for a further appointment; People who were late to work and had to work extra hours without pay to make up the time; An HGV driver unable to deliver £5,000 worth of food to a hospital. Perhaps ironically given the causes you espouse, an individual invited to answer questions at the House of Lords before the All Party Parliamentary Group for Water, who was unable to attend the meeting and incurred wasted expenses...
In your case Roger Hallam, the sentence is 5 years' imprisonment. In your cases Daniel Shaw, Lucia Whittaker de Abreu, Lousie Lancaster and Cressida Gethin, the sentence is 4 years' imprisonment.
International
'Judge dismisses classified documents case against Donald Trump; Special counsel’s office to appeal'
A federal judge on Monday dismissed the classified documents case against Donald Trump, a shock ruling that clears away one of the major legal challenges facing the former president. In a 93-page ruling, District Judge Aileen Cannon said the appointment of special counsel Jack Smith violated the Constitution. She did not rule on whether Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified documents was proper or not...
Other
'The Disease Not The Cure - Andrew Malkinson & The CCRC'
...In plain English Andrew Malkinson’s DNA was not found ANYWHERE in the samples taken in his case. The DNA of ANOTHER man was. That DNA was found in an obviously crime specific location and yet the CCRC took the view, for years, that the human evidence leading to the conviction was safe and sufficiently safe such as to render the DNA evidence irrelevant for the CCRC’s one purpose, which is to decide whether to send a case back to the Court of Appeal to look again. That decision was as inexplicable as it was wrong as it was enraging. You do not need to be a lawyer to discern that...