FRESH EVIDENCE

The jury directions given at the trial of a well-known publicist for historical sexual offences had not been inadequate or unfair, and his conviction for indecent assault was safe.

The Criminal Cases Review Commission had been justified in refusing to refer the claimant’s two convictions for sexual offences to the Court of Appeal. The fresh evidence on which he had sought to rely did not give rise to a real possibility that the convictions would not be upheld.

The conviction of a vulnerable adult with a severe learning disability for the offence of sexual activity by a care worker with a person with a mental disability was unsafe, and was accordingly quashed, where inadequate consideration had been given to his learning disability in the course of the trial. Fresh psychological evidence demonstrated that he would have had difficulty in dealing with leading questions asked in cross-examination, and that might have left the jury with a false impression.

A conviction for sexual offences against a child was safe, as medical evidence adduced as fresh had not permitted confident review of a previous diagnosis so as to describe it as ill-founded; taken at its highest it neither supported nor refuted the allegations against the offender. The defence was still that any abuse was perpetrated by another and the jury had decided on the non-medical evidence.

A conviction for sexual assault was safe where a judge had refused to grant an adjournment to allow the defence time to contact a witness mentioned by the victim for the first time in her evidence in chief. Instead the judge had admitted hearsay evidence which indicated that the witness would not have been able to support the victim’s case.

Alleged failures in pre-trial investigation procedure did not affect the safety of the convictions of soldiers found guilty of kidnapping, sexual assault, theft and assault occasioning actual bodily harm.

The fact that an intermediary had provided physical and emotional support to a vulnerable and distressed complainant during a rape trial did not result in a serious risk of unfairness to the defendant. Both counsel and the judge had warned the jury to approach the complainant’s evidence untrammelled by sympathy.

Developments in medical knowledge that reduced the diagnostic significance of physical signs of abuse in children did not render a conviction prior to the change in approach unsafe.

Although the prosecution’s failure to disclose to a defendant certain evidence casting doubt upon the credibility of the complainant in his rape trial was deplorable, the evidence was not so significant as to have affected the safety of the rape convictions.