A Disgrace

It is common knowledge that the balance of power at the lower end of the employment market has shifted firmly in favour of employers. The minimum wage has become the usual wage in a wide range of occupations. I fear that for some employers this situation has bred arrogance in their management.

An incident recently happened at the close of business in a local pub operated by a large and profitable chain. Attempts were made to steal from the business. The deputy manager on duty rightly called the police, who were pleased to find that there was CCTV available. The manager  helped the police to investigate the crime and stood by as the recordings were viewed and SOCOs took lifts of fingerprints. She finally left to go home at around 5 am. Unbelievably, she was not paid for the more-or-less five hours that she spent protecting her employer's interests, while the multi-millionaire owner of the business was no doubt safely tucked up in his mansion, or on his boat.
He should be ashamed of himself and of his company.

By the way, the CCTV was lost somewhere between the police and the CPS, but the lady concerned gave clear evidence of what it had shown.

The CPS should also be ashamed of itself for a pathetic failure to put together a proper case. But then they don't do shame any more than the smug millionaire who owns the pub.

The Vice Tightens

Ever-anxious as I am to keep you up to date with happenings in the courts, the current squabble between the Magistrates' Association and the National Bench Chairmen's Forum has excited my curiosity about the casus belli that has sparked it. I find it hard to view a bubbling pot without feeling the need to give it a stir, so I have had a look at the document involved. It seems from Gross LJ's report on Judicial Governance in the Magistrates' Courts (you can look it up) that magistrates' fingers are to be further prised from the levers of power in our courts. Hitherto the JIG (Justices' Issues Group) for each cluster of courts has included their Bench Chairs. Now the groups are to be much larger with only three or so Chairmen at the meetings, giving them no say in the management of the courts.
The MoJ has gradually become more centralised, with the de facto abolition of the Justices' Clerks (if not their titles). The old JCs were independent and answerable to their court's committee - now they are civil servants answerable to the Minister, only their legal advice being protected and independent.
Too many in the MoJ see JPs as a kind of lower-level staff to be buggered around at will, and not many of us can see the process coming to an end.

De Minimis (2)

One or two commenters have been scathing about my suggestion that some cases are too small to bother a court with. I am afraid that if they realised the vast number of cases that are NFA (no further action) at the police station, or not proceeded with by the CPS, or dropped at various stages through the court process they might be very surprised and shocked. Of course any crime is bad for society and bad for the victim but we have to keep a sense of proportion. The proportion of offences that are charged or summonsed is tiny.
There is also cost to consider. One lesson from the post-crash years is that desirable things are often not done because the cost cannot be justified in the greater scheme of things. The case I mentioned probably cost a good £1000 all in, and that is before the ongoing cost of keeping an eye on our two heroes in the future. It's an imperfect world down here, and we shall have to see how things pan out in the next.

De Minimis?

We heard a trial yesterday that took a good four hours to deal with, including three-quarters of an hour sitting out the back drinking coffee, while the CPS finally served the last of the required disclosure, and the defence read it. Each of the two defendants faced four charges, but by 10.30 the Crown had dropped all but one against each man.
The allegation was theft of goods worth ten to fifteen pounds from a garden shed, and the two men affirmed their pleas of not guilty. There was some identification evidence that contained enough inconsistencies to render it unreliable, and  we were just left with the principle of Recent Possession to consider. Briefly, they had the stuff with them when arrested within half an hour of the theft, which creates a presumption that they were either the thieves or the handlers. So guilty it was. Neither had significant previous so the guidelines pointed to sentences at the bottom of the range. We laboriously wrote out our reasons, and went back in. The CPS asked for about £800 costs, plus a surcharge, so we were left with an impossible task to extract that kind of money from two men on benefits. On the whole, although we did it by the book, the case felt unsatisfactory. Realistically, the CPS should have dropped it, given the very low value involved but the stripped-down staff numbers that they now have do not allow for thorough reviews. Not a good omen for the future.

Who The Heck is This?

This photograph appears in the Law Society Gazette, and the paper claims it shows Richard Monkhouse, MA chairman. I have known Richard for some years, and this looks nothing like him. Is there some foul plot to discredit Richard and the MA by trying to make him look like a nuttter?T

He actually looks like this:-

Diversity Galore

I am due to sit tomorrow, and as usual I have no idea what will be waiting for me, other than the fact that I shall chair the court. If my last sitting is anything to go by the daily list will bear hardly any local-sounding names, a reflection of the great and increasing diversity of our patch. Let's see how it goes.

Penny Wise Pound Foolish

I sat on a couple of trials yesterday, prosecuted by a dreadful Crown Prosecutor who is slow-thinking and long winded. We found both defendants not guilty, because the cases both came down to 'he said, she said' conflicts of evidence. An allegation of breach of a restraining order was based on the making of one call between a bitterly estranged couple, but presumably for reasons of cost no arrangements had been made to download the defendant's phone. Hence we could not be sure, as we are required to be, so not guilty it was. I don't know what a download costs, but this case wasted half a day of court time, and that isn't cheap either.  The other case was a workplace spat between two people; the only independent witness didn't turn up so once again we could not be sure to the very high standard of Beyond Reasonable Doubt.
It must be a horrible experience to sit in court while the magistrates are outside deliberating, and the tension rises before our verdict.

Innocence Abhorred

I am not an easy man to shock, but a case last week gave me a lot to think about. I cannot say too much, but the core of the case was that a young girl was being threatened by girls from her school, and consequences ensued from that.
Three young girls gave evidence via video, and they came across as ordinary kids, typical of our area. As the saying goes, butter would not melt..
As evidence emerged it turned out that one girl was a victim of nasty bullying, and that an incident had arisen when one of her bullies assembled a gang and went to the vicinity of the victim's house, the whole business being co-ordinated by BBM (Blackberry messenger) ( A kind of mobile telephone, m'lud).
My colleagues and I each concluded that this was a 'Lord of The Flies'  situation. The targeted girl said in evidence that she and he ringleader had fallen out last year, but that she could not remember why. The reasons have faded, but the hatred remains fresh.
I can't say much more about this, but as a human being and a grandfather of two little girls I find it depressing that children in a a comfortable area of a rich country in the 21st century can behave with such basic savagery. What on earth will they be like when they are adults?

Cruel Deception

I agree with this piece on the Spiked site. The tabloid-driven sentimental slush about victims was right up the street of the Blair government. Cruelly, victims get to express their pain (providing, by the way, some nice sexy headlines) while the judge is specifically forbidden to adjust his sentence as a result.

Goodbye Old Friend

My long standing friend, defence solicitor John Cochrane, met me for a pint last week, and told me that he has appeared in court for the last time. He is a victim, along with many others, of the emasculation of Legal Aid, and plans to move away from London. The cost of his practising certificate and  professional indemnity insurance would be such that it would hardly be worth his while to carry on working, especially as he is less than a year off pension age. I shall miss him. He is a very good advocate, thorough and professional, but has never taken himself too seriously. I have often shared a lunchtime glass with him, and gone back into court to deal impartially and professionally with his case, exactly as we should do. He won an excellent Abuse of Process argument before us one day, and I still remember that his case was based on R v Croydon Justices, although that name is all that I do remember. When a good friend of mine was involved in a tragic road accident I had no hesitation in pointing him towards John, who did a first class job at a court some way away. I hope to see him in Court Seven* when he comes back to visit his old haunts. 

*Court Seven is the preferred name for the pub round the corner from the court.