The Defence Brief

A suffragette being arrested in 1914 We are approaching the one hundredth anniversary of women first winning the right to vote, albeit in 1918 only land-owning women aged over 30 were to be given the right to vote. The right to vote was won by campaigners who fought, often literally, for the rights of women. Many women were arrested, tried and convicted of criminal offences in respect of their protests and now, a century later, there are calls for them to be pardoned for their crimes as homosexual men were for theirs. Amber Rudd has promised only today that she will look at individual cases. But, what is a pardon? Strictly speaking, a pardon is an exercise of the Royal prerogative of mercy. It does not expunge a conviction, nor does it mean that the person pardoned was not guilty of an offence. A pardon simply removes from the convicted person all penalties and punishments arising from the conviction. In ye olden days it was thus a legal instrument used by the monarch ...

Royal Courts of Justice - home of the Court of Appeal Friday last saw the publication of judgment by the Court of Appeal Criminal Division (CACD) in the case of R v Ordu. In 2007, Mr Ordu entered the UK via Germany using a false passport. He was prosecuted under the now defunct Identity Cards Act 2006 for possessing false identity documents with intent. Section 31 of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999 was in force at the time (and indeed is still in force, although it has been amended); it creates a defence for refugees fleeing persecution. It was supposed to bring the law into compliance with the UK’s treaty obligations arising from the Refugee Convention. Section 31 was badly drafted because it barred people who had stopped over in another safe country on their way to the UK from relying on the defence; however, the Convention specifically required the UK (and other signatories) to extend the defence to such people. Despite this glaring conflict the law at the time ...

We wake up this morning to the news that Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito have been cleared of the murder of Meredith Kercher on appeal. Having read the news this morning I cannot say exactly why they were cleared because I wasn’t in court to hear the ruling and the press are reporting some very bizarre factors that I cannot imagine were on the minds of the judges.   For example, the BBC   in its 10 factors that helped Knox’s case, lists such things as a “PR campaign” launched from Seattle and the presence of supporters in the courtroom.   I can confidently say that neither of these things would be likely to have any impact upon an English or Welsh court. Perhaps the most informative thing in the BBC reports are that the Italian justice system has a very lenient appeals system where the court simply investigates the weakest aspect of the prosecution case.   If true then it certainly does explain why Italy has a very low prison population. In the UK, the appea...