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
Prosecution Fee Increases
BREAKING NEWS from #BarCouncil - DPP @MaxHillKC announces that he is pleased to confirm that additional funding has been secured and "we can now press ahead to restore parity [of prosecution fees] with defence fees." A strong and evidence-based case was made to the Treasury.
"We are confident that changes can be made within two months once the final shape of the package has been made" - @MaxHillKC announcing to #BarCouncil that prosecution fees will be raised to restore parity with defence fees
'Murder trial adjourned for three days because heating not working'
A murder trial was adjourned for three days because the heating was broken, the Law Society's deputy vice-president has told MPs. Richard Atkinson, a managing partner at Tuckers Solicitors, was giving evidence on the state of the justice system to the House of Commons home affairs select committee yesterday. He said: ‘What we know is there are now just about 5,000 cases outstanding that have been waiting two years or more for trial. We know that the buildings are in a terrible state.’ In a shocking report published by the Law Society last December, hundreds of solicitors said they experienced delays in cases being heard due to the state of the court within the past 12 months.
Atkinson told the committee: ‘A case that I had, which concluded only a couple of weeks ago, was a multi-handed number of defendants in a murder trial. Obviously huge resources. And for three days in that trial it could not sit because the heating wasn’t working. I’ve been made aware of a case where two defendants were to be sentenced for serious matters but couldn’t be because the judge was told the cells were closed because the heating wasn’t working. So the physical state of the estate is contributing to delay. 'The delays are a problem and then you have the issues around personnel involved,' Atkinson added. As well as insufficient number of judges, there was an ‘enormous crisis’ facing defence solicitors. Atkinson said: ‘I’ve already mentioned how, in the last five years, we’ve lost over 1,200 duty solicitors. The number of firms is collapsing. The number of young people coming forward is tiny… The system is creaking in all aspects and it’s from decades of underfunding.’
Criminal Bar Association chair Kirsty Brimelow KC told the committee that a major reason behind prosecutions being diminished was due to an insufficient number of prosecutors. In the 15 months up to 30 September 2022, 364 cases were adjourned on the day because no prosecution advocate could be found. One of Brimelow's colleagues has already had three rape cases in 2023 adjourned until the end of the year...
'Rollout of new fixed fee for cases with s.28 hearings'
A new fixed fee is being introduced to recognise the extra work carried out by advocates for pre-recorded cross-examination videos in cases with s.28 hearings. Advocates will be able to claim a new £670 fixed fee from 1 February 2023 which will increase the payment levels for cases with s.28 hearings. The new fixed fee applies to cases with a representation order dated on or after 1 February...
'Violent offences reduced in areas with multi-agency partnerships'
Eighteen areas of England and Wales most blighted by violent crime have been receiving targeted funding for the past three years, to increase police patrols in crime hotspots and provide more support to at-risk young people. An independent evaluation published today of the government’s ‘hotspot’ policing programme and network of Violence Reduction Units (VRUs) has revealed promising signs the approach is working, with 136,000 violence without injury offences estimated to have been prevented in areas with the programmes. There are also positive indications that homicides and hospital admissions for violent injuries are reducing in these locations as a result of this funding.
The results come as the new Serious Violence Duty comes into force today, which was brought in by the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 and places a legal duty on public bodies to work together to drive down serious violence.
'Hundreds of drug-driving convictions in peril after mass errors at testing lab'
Hundreds of drug-driving convictions have been thrown into doubt after more than 1,700 lab tests conducted over 21 months had to be withdrawn.Problems with tests carried out by Synlab Laboratory Services Limited were identified by the company in December 2020, sparking a mass review by police and the forensic science regulator into the scale of the problem.
On Monday the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) announced that all drug-driving tests produced by Synlab between April 2019 and December 2020 where levels were found to be above the prescribed limit must be withdrawn. This included 1,778 positive drug samples which were deployed in prosecutions. The Crown Prosecution Service is now contacting defendants who are affected, with the previously-incriminating evidence now being withdrawn...
'Improvements to Common Platform for defence professionals'
We’re adding features to Common Platform and making improvements to the way legal professionals search for case details, check in for hearings, and access and complete essential forms.
Since Monday 30 January 2023, legal professionals will have seen a number of system improvements, which include:
- quicker and easier check-in process for court hearings – the same screen can be used to check-in as prosecution or defence
- updated case details section, including a timeline, pleas and case results
- easier switching between cases for defendants you’re representing
- details for all defendants you’re representing in a multi-defendant case in one place
- view any client applications and their status more easily (including related material)
Cases
R v Holmes [2023] EWCA Crim 58
This is the hearing of an appeal against conviction and sentence. The appeal against conviction raises issues about whether the facts relied on by the prosecution, which the jury, by their verdict, must have been sure were proved and were carried out for the appellant's sexual satisfaction, amounted to "gross indecency" for the purposes of section 1 of the Indecency with Children Act 1960. The statement of offence for the purposes of an indictment is referred to as "indecency with a child, contrary to section 1(1) of the Indecency with Children Act 1960", see Archbold, Criminal Pleading Evidence and Practice 2023 ("Archbold") at 20-380a, and in the summary of the factual background we have referred to the offence as indecency with a child even though the statutory wording is "gross indecency"...
We do not consider that we should accept the appellant's invitation to attempt a definition of "gross indecency". This is because: first the phrase "gross indecency" has an ordinary meaning which juries have been able to determine and apply without difficulty for many years; secondly, as appears above, decided cases have set the boundaries of the offence so that it is sufficiently certain to have regulated the behaviour of persons subject to the criminal law and section 1 of the Indecency with Children Act 1960; thirdly, and part evidencing the second reason set out above, it was apparent from the appellant's own evidence at trial that he knew what were proper boundaries for his behaviour. He gave evidence that he had not acted or conducted himself in the grossly indecent way alleged by the complainants but it is apparent from their verdicts that the jury were sure that he had. Further reasons are that the courts have avoided accepting such an invitation to define "gross indecency" for over a hundred years, and "gross indecency", while still relevant for prosecution of some older offences pre-dating the Sexual Offences Act 2003, has now been replaced by different statutory wording in the 2003 Act. In our judgment the judge was entitled to find that there was a case to answer on the counts that he left to the jury...
Other
'Prosecution and defence need equal pay'
Andrew Cayley KC is quick to acknowledge that prosecutors in England and Wales take a lot of flack — and indeed, some of that criticism has come from him. Two years ago Cayley was appointed chief inspector of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) after having spent seven years as the director of service prosecutions, which primarily brings military courts martial cases. He changed briefs in the midst of a criminal justice system struggling under the restrictions of the Covid pandemic and a record-breaking backlog of cases in the crown courts...
On the point of whether the CPS needed to recruit more in-house advocates to lessen its reliance on the independent Bar for less-serious cases, Cayley primarily deferred to Hill. However, he is a strong supporter of the independent Bar, and said that for the very serious cases the CPS “will always instruct criminal silks”. He added that “the best place to develop those skills is at the criminal Bar. And the only way you are going to produce people like that is to have a healthy junior criminal bar, as opposed to people within a federal justice system. They are just better quality advocates.”
'What really happens when you go into witness protection'
TV dramas get it all wrong, says the woman with one of the most secretive jobs in law enforcement...