Thursday, April 17, 2014

Fairness and contempt proceedings

Procedural fairness in contempt proceedings is the topic of general interest in Dhooharika v The Director of Public Prosecutions (Mauritius) [2014] UKPC 11 (16 April 2014). Of subsidiary interest is the analysis of the common law offence of scandalising the court.

The appellant, a newspaper editor, had published comments that were subsequently held by the Supreme Court of Mauritius to have undermined public confidence in the independence of the judiciary and the administration of justice.

This offence of contempt requires that, as an actus reus, the act or writing published must carry a real risk that public confidence in the administration of justice will be undermined, and the mens rea is intentionally, or subjectively recklessly, undermining public confidence in the administration of justice [42], [48] – [49].

As to fairness [50]:

“ ... The Board understands that it may be necessary for the DPP in an appropriate case to take summary action and that a classic form of trial may not always be necessary, but the Board is of the clear view that the alleged contemnor is always entitled to a fair trial and that, depending upon the circumstances, he will almost certainly be entitled to call oral evidence on his behalf, including his own evidence. In the instant case the Board has formed the view that the appellant was, as a matter of practical fact, deprived of his right to give evidence on his own behalf.”

Since the trial was unfair the conviction could not stand [54], but independently of the fairness difficulty, the published comments were not proved to have been made in bad faith [57] (meaning that mens rea was not proved).

The conviction was quashed, but the Judicial Committee observed that the procedure at sentencing had been unfair [60]:

“[The Board] ... would have allowed the appeal against sentence on the simple ground that the appellant should have been afforded an opportunity to make submissions in mitigation before a conclusion as to the correct sentence was reached. The transcript shows that the court proceeded to sentence immediately after delivering its judgment on the merits. There were a number of points which could have been advanced on his behalf in support of the conclusion that a custodial sentence was not necessary. The experience of this case shows that the prosecuting authorities should be careful to remind the trial court of the need to hear and consider submissions that go to possible mitigation of the sentence before sentence is pronounced.”

The Board surveys the history of contempt by scandalising the court [21] – [26], and considers its continuing existence, particularly in Mauritius but also elsewhere in the Commonwealth [29] – [41] (especially at [38] and Annex 1 to the judgment).

And (this is me now, not the UKPC) aspects of the law of contempt remain uncertain. Perhaps because flexibility in procedure may be essential if contempt has to be dealt with urgently, statutory procedures leave some areas untouched. Are there occasions when a charging document should be filed and the usual criminal procedures utilised, even though dealing with the alleged contempt may fall only within the court’s inherent power (see O’Brien v R [2014] UKSC 23 (2 April 2014), noted here on 4 April 2014)? How can a charging document be filed if there is no enactment against which the contempt is alleged? If there is no charging document, how should the court record its orders? If civil procedures are adopted to initiate proceedings, to what extend do they colour subsequent steps?

Some points can be stated with confidence because they have been established by case law. As Finn, Mathias and Mansfield say in Criminal Procedure in New Zealand (Thomson Reuters, Westlaw NZ online) at [1.3.3]:

“Both common law and enacted contempt require the criminal standard of proof [footnote: Newman (t/a Mantella Publishing) v Modern Bookbinders Ltd [2000] 1 WLR 2559, [2000] 2 All ER 814  (CA)]  and the alleged contemnor has the rights of a person charged. [footnote: Siemer v Solicitor-General [2010] NZSC 54, [2010] 3 NZLR 767 at [53]–[56] per Blanchard, Wilson and Anderson JJ]  Neither form of contempt carries a right to elect jury trial and all offences of contempt are subject to maximum penalties which are less than the level at which jury trial could be elected. [footnote: Siemer v Solicitor-General [2010] NZSC 54, [2010] 3 NZLR 767 at [60], [62]–[65] and [67] per Blanchard, Wilson and Anderson JJ, decided under the former law which gave the right to elect jury trial whenever (with a few exceptions, such as those which were mentioned in the Summary Offences Act 1981, s 43, with due respect to Tutu v R [2012] NZCA 294 at [19]) the maximum penalty was imprisonment for more than three months. Now all contempts are category 2 offences.]  The judge must identify the act or acts giving rise to the alleged contempt with sufficient particularity to ensure the defendant understands what is alleged, and must give the defendant the opportunity to take legal advice.”

Whether there is still a need for the common law offence of scandalising the court may be debatable, as is illustrated by the points made by Lord Pannick and referred to in Dhooharika at [28].

Our Law Commission is currently reviewing the law of contempt. And there is a particularly interesting paper by Professor ATH Smith, Reforming the New Zealand Law of Contempt of Court – An Issues/Discussion Paper available at Crown Law.

Friday, April 04, 2014

Points to file away ...

To do an act “with” the defendant
Policy was an important consideration in interpreting the phrase “to do an indecent act with or upon” the defendant in s 2(1B) of the Crimes Act 1961 [NZ], where the defendant, an adult, induced young people to masturbate in his presence but without any physical contact or overt participation by him: Y (SC40/2013) v R [2014] NZSC 34 (3 April 2014). The policy point is apparent at [16].

Equally interesting is the submission made for the appellant that the interpretation imposing liability on the defendant would amount to retrospective criminalisation, in view of decisions that appeared to suggest he would not be liable. At [27] the Court noted that the earlier decisions did not deal with situations where young people had performed the indecent acts, so this was not retrospective criminalisation.

Civil but contemptuous
The distinction between civil and criminal contempt of court was the basis for holding that extradition on a criminal matter did not operate to bar proceedings for an earlier civil contempt, in O’Brien v R [2014] UKSC 23 (2 April 2014). The distinction between civil and criminal contempt is mentioned at [37] – [40], [42]. It is the nature of the defendant’s conduct that determines the category of the contempt.

Friday, March 28, 2014

They say we can't, but we say we can! Fairness trumps logic in the Privy Council.

Every judge dislikes constraints on jurisdiction that impede justice. One can be confident about that.

In our legal system – and perhaps in yours too – the greatest jurisdiction is given to the senior trial court, the High Court, while the appeal courts, the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court, have jurisdiction that is limited by statute.

You might think that it would be sensible to give the final appeal court the greatest jurisdiction. But no, that is not the way that the legislature has decided to distribute jurisdiction. Admittedly, an appeal court should not need original jurisdiction, so that difference is understandable. But once an appeal court has a case before it, it should be able to do anything that another court could lawfully do.

Yesterday the Privy Council riled against a jurisdictional constraint and turned its face, by a majority, against a logically irrefutable limitation on its jurisdiction to order commutation of a death sentence to life imprisonment: Ramdeen v The State (Trinidad and Tobago) [2014] UKPC 7 (27 March 2014).

Justice overrode logic. The appeal was against conviction, and after lengthy delays during the course of judicial process [conviction 29 July 2008, appeals dismissed in T&T 26 February 2010, leave to appeal to the Board granted 18 March 2013, this appeal heard 23 January 2014], it was dismissed by this Board. Should the death sentence stand, notwithstanding that it had not been appealed? The prosecutor indicated no enthusiasm for its imposition.

Lord Toulson, with Lord Kerr [49], [58], [59] and, separately, Lord Neuberger [68], agreeing, held that the Board was seised of the criminal proceedings as a whole once it granted leave to appeal against conviction, and that as it was satisfied that carrying out the sentence would be unlawful in view of the inhumanity caused by the delay, it had the power to order commutation instead of requiring further proceedings to be brought on that issue. Fairness and convenience both pointed to this conclusion [69].

Lord Mance, with whom Lord Sumption agreed, dissented on logical grounds. They had no doubt that the appellant’s ordinary remedies in Trinidad and Tobago would be forthcoming.

Saturday, March 22, 2014

Can technology make extradition for trial unnecessary?

If you need clarification of disclosure obligations in the context of extradition proceedings involving the “record of case” procedure, Dotcom v United States of America [2014] NZSC 24 (21 March 2014) should be of assistance.

The decision of the Court is in the joint judgment of McGrath and Blanchard JJ (delivered by McGrath J), the concurring judgment of William Young J, and the partially concurring judgment of Glazebrook J. See [153], [172], [177], [191], [194]; [213] – [217], [221] – [223], [228].

Where legislation permits a slightly more relaxed approach to treaty obligations, so that there is more room for fairness, the dissent of Elias CJ, and the partial dissent of Glazebrook J deserve consideration.

The central concept is the “duty of candour”, pursuant to which a requesting state must disclose to the defendant any information that [152] “destroys or very seriously undermines the evidence” on which the requesting state relies (adopting Lord Bingham in Knowles v Government of the United States of America [2006] UKPC 38, [2007] 1 WLR 47 at [35]).

Enforcing this duty of candour, in the absence of judicial powers to make orders, requires the court to rely on the candour of a party that may well not want to be candid. Of course the judges didn’t put it like that [177]:

“We accept that there will be exceptional cases where an extradition judge might want further information to be sought from the requesting state. Such concerns will usually be resolved through dialogue between the Court and counsel. In cases where that does not meet the perceived need, we also accept the view expressed in [Norris v Government of the United States [2008] UKHL 16, [2008] AC 920 at [107]] by Lord Bingham that where the relevant extradition treaty provides for government-to-government requests to be made for additional information or evidence, as art 12 of the Treaty does, that formal procedure may be availed of. The Court should inform counsel for the requesting party that the Court wishes to receive further information from the requesting state. Counsel must then bring the matter to the attention of the appropriate New Zealand Ministers so that a decision on whether to request the further information through diplomatic channels is made and given due effect.”

The weakness in this legislated scheme is obvious. The “state” seeking extradition is really a group of people whose jobs are to be prosecutors. They have allegiance to their country. They believe they have right on their side. So-called “states” do not treat each other with candour: if they did there would be a lot of unemployed spies.

Is the meaning of a “fair” extradition hearing different from the meaning of a “fair” trial? Fairness in extradition hearings requires impartial determination of the facts – in the sense of giving the evidence appropriate weight and determining issues without bias – in deciding whether a prima facie case has been established by the requesting state. There must be evidence, summarised in the record of case (where that procedure applies), on every element that the prosecutor would have to prove at trial. None of that evidence can be so unreliable that no fact-finder would accept it. The defendant must be able to challenge the reliability of the evidence, and that may require access to information that only the prosecutor may have. The prosecutor may be unaware of weaknesses in the case for extradition, or may not appreciate the magnitude of a possible weakness.

There is a point on which one might have reservations about the reasoning at [161] of the joint judgment (and concurred by William Young J at [228]). Disclosure, the judges seem to be saying, is not required when the defendant has independent knowledge of the facts. But the difficulty with this is that disclosure enables the defendant to know how the prosecutor intends to prove the facts needed to establish a prima facie case. It doesn't matter what the defendant knows, it's what the prosecutor knows, and how that knowledge was obtained, and whether it is admissible as evidence, that the defendant needs disclosure of, to challenge the assertion that there is a prima facie case.

It seems obvious that the statutory scheme for extradition where the record of case procedure is used does not meet the requirements of a fair hearing, because of constraints on disclosure of the prosecutor's case and the requirement that courts accept - although on a supposedly "rebuttable" basis - the candour of the prosecutor. You could hardly get a clearer example of the legislature requiring the court to take a biased stance. Yet the majority judges don't accept this. In considering whether the scheme complies with the requirements of natural justice [193], [229], [239] they - in effect - explain why it doesn't then they say that it does.

If there are questions about the power of the legislature to require courts of justice to act unjustly, resort will be had to the inherent powers of the court to act in the interests of justice. Elias CJ and Glazebrook J seek to advance this principle. The majority refer [181] to the court's ability to refuse extradition after a "meaningful judicial assessment of whether the evidence is sufficient to meet the threshold of a prima facie case", and the word "meaningful" may, one may speculate, encompass cases where there is a judicial sense that unacceptable unfairness has occurred.

Lord Devlin said something sensible in Connelly v DPP [1964] AC 1254, 1354, which I quoted in an article that, for reasons that now nearly escape me, I called "Criminal Equity" [2000] New Zealand Law Journal 427, a copy of which is available here.

In these times of technological sophistication, when trials do not really require the presence of defendants, or often even of witnesses, because they can participate remotely by audio visual links, extradition may only be necessary when a person is required to be present in court for sentencing.

Saturday, March 15, 2014

Have you tried marine biology?

I’m told that there are some people who need to use little untruths to advance their chance of romantic success.

The most famous example I can think of is George Kostanza in Seinfeld, 5th season, episode 14: “The Marine Biologist”. Being thought of as a marine biologist did indeed enhance George’s prospects, but it also led to a call to action of another sort.

In R v Hutchinson, 2014 SCC 19 (7 March 2014) Mr Hutchinson’s untruth was of a more mundane kind: it came down to saying, “This is a really good condom.”

In fact he had put pin pricks in it, hoping to make his partner pregnant but knowing she did not want that. The result was she did become pregnant.

Had the complainant consented to the sexual activity?

The Court was unanimous in dismissing the appeal, but for differing reasons. The majority said yes, she had consented but her consent was vitiated by the dishonesty. Consent had been given to the sexual activity in question, and consent does not have to extend to the conditions or qualities of the act, such as birth control measures. However there was dishonesty which resulted in serious bodily harm [67] – [70], and this constituted the fraud that vitiated consent.

The minority said no, there was no consent ab initio, because use of the condom was part of the sexual activity and the complainant had the right to determine how she was touched, how the sexual activity she engaged in was carried out. It was not necessary to look for a vitiating factor such as fraud, as there was no consent from the beginning.

The majority found some difficulties with the minority reasoning [45] – [53]. How are the boundaries of the sexual activity, the nature and quality of the act, defined?

If a complainant had thought she was being propositioned by a marine biologist (this is my example, not the Court’s), and if she wouldn’t have had sex with the real George, would she be consenting to the ensuing sexual activity? If so, would her consent be vitiated by fraud?

Sunday, March 09, 2014

My goodness! Is that a gun?

For what would be accepted in the common law world as a conventional analysis of secondary liability insofar as it applied to the facts of Rosemond v United States, USSC No 12-895, 5 March 2014, see the judgment of the Court delivered by Kagan J (with significant agreement by Alito J, joined by Thomas J, in dissent).

It is the point over which the dissent occurred that is of interest to you and me.

The relevant offence was double-barrelled: committing a drug dealing offence, while in possession of a firearm. Does the secondary party, who assists or encourages the offence, have to help with both the dealing and the firearm possession? No disagreement here: it is only necessary that the defendant provides assistance or encouragement with some part of the offence. Does the secondary party have to know of all the circumstances – both the dealing and the firearm? Again, no disagreement: the defendant must know of all the circumstances of the offending.

But what if the defendant, present during the commission of the drug dealing, only becomes aware of the firearm after it is too late to withdraw from participation? The defendant may not be able realistically to say, “Everyone stop! No guns!” because that might risk the safety of other people or even of the defendant himself.

Here the dissenters say this is like the affirmative defences of duress or necessity: the defendant is saying he can’t withdraw because of forces beyond his control. He should, according to the relevant law (not universally applicable), have to prove those defences. They do not negate an element of the offence.

The majority disagreed with that (slip op, p 10 footnote 10). The question is one of fact: what did the defendant intend to assist or encourage? Evidence that he only learn’t of the firearm after the drug deal had commenced would be relevant to whether he intended to assist or encourage the firearm possession. His continuation with his participation could be consistent with him encouraging the gun element, or not: that is a matter the fact-finder would have to determine (see slip op, p 13, footnote 9). The prosecutor must, when such issues are raised, prove the necessary intent without a burden of proof passing to the defendant.

Defences like duress or necessity could, on relevant facts and subject to local law, be available, and again, subject to local law, may only require the defendant to raise them as live issues by pointing to some supporting evidence.

Normally, aside from in offences that include a proscribed purpose, the law does not concern itself with the motive behind an intention; Robin Hood was a thief. Where an intention existed because the defendant faced circumstances that it would be beyond normal human fortitude to endure, a defence of necessity might be available. But not necessarily. This is where policy limits on justifications and excuses operate. In Rosemond the Supreme Court majority lowered the moral hurdle for defendants by allowing a motive for an intention to limit responsibility even though the stricter requirements of an affirmative defence would not be satisfied.

I doubt that this would be a universally acceptable recognition of human frailty.



Thursday, March 06, 2014

Hidden defences and concealed charges

Defence lawyers are familiar with the difficulty of deciding how to make the best of one defence while not losing a fall-back defence in the event that the first is unsuccessful. You can’t credibly build a case that “My client didn’t do it, but if he did he was forced to, but if he wasn’t he did it in self defence, but if he didn’t it was an accident.” Plainly the defence case is that the defendant didn’t do it. The judge, on the other hand, may have to consider evidence that if the defendant did do it, he acted in self defence, or that some other defence appears on the evidence to require to be considered.

“Discharge of the trial judge's role in ensuring fairness to the accused requires that the jury receives instruction on any defence or partial defence, provided there is material raising it, regardless of the tactical decisions of counsel [Footnote: Pemble v The Queen [1971] HCA 20; (1971) 124 CLR 107 at 117-118 per Barwick CJ.]. Among other things, this recognises the forensic difficulty of relying on inconsistent defences. The tactical decision not to rely on a defence or partial defence, whether objectively sound or otherwise, does not relieve the trial judge of the obligation to instruct the jury on how on a view of the facts a defence or partial defence arises.”

James v The Queen [2014] HCA 6 (5 March 2014) joint judgment at [31], and see Gageler J at [69].

Another aspect of the judge’s duty to ensure a fair trial for the defendant comes into play when a separate issue arises: should the judge leave open the opportunity for a conviction on another offence that may, on the evidence adduced at trial, have been committed? That is, by way of an alternative verdict. For example, a defendant may argue on an appeal against conviction that the trial court did not have the opportunity to consider a lesser offence in respect of which it may have preferred to find the defendant guilty.

In James the jury had found the defendant guilty of intentionally causing serious injury. There had been an alternative count of recklessly causing serious injury. On appeal he argued that the jury should have had the opportunity to consider the lesser offence of intentionally causing injury (that is, ordinary old injury). The defence case at trial had been that the defendant had caused the injury accidentally.

A tactical decision had been made at trial not to seek the alternative verdict of intentionally causing injury.

The defendant was understandably not, at trial, saying “It was an accident, but if it wasn’t I didn’t appreciate the risk of injury, but if I did, I didn’t mean to cause injury, but if I did, I didn’t mean it to be serious injury.” He wanted the jury to reject the serious allegation and to acquit him outright, without bothering itself over whether he may have committed the lesser offence.

On the facts of this case, where a car had allegedly been used to cause the injury, the majority, French CJ, Hayne, Crennan, Kiefel, Bell and Keane JJ, held that there had been no unfairness because it would be artificially subtle [47] to expect the jury to distinguish between an intent to cause serious, as opposed to ordinary, injury, and that the defendant could not have been prejudiced by the omission an alternative verdict [48]. Gageler J dissented on this issue. He regarded the distinctions between the degrees of injury as something that the jury could have considered when determining the defendant’s state of mind [88]. Since the defendant could have been convicted of the lesser offence, he concluded that there had been a substantial miscarriage of justice in not leaving it for the jury’s decision [89].

The judicial approach to alternative verdicts is summarised by the majority [37]:

“ ... At a trial at which neither party seeks to rely on an included offence, the trial judge may rightly assess that proof of the accused's guilt of that offence is not a real issue. In such an event, it would be contrary to basic principle for the trial judge to embark on instruction respecting proof of guilt of the included offence ... .”

But Gageler J considered [71] that the relevant statutory environment required the judge to direct the jury on alternative offences

“ ... whenever it was open on the evidence for the jury to find the accused not guilty of the offence charged but guilty of the alternative offence, unless the giving of the direction would be unfair to the accused in the particular circumstances of the case.”

He observed that this was consistent with the common law as stated by Lord Bingham in R v Coutts, discussed here on 21 July 2006.

The majority, however, put the focus on the real issues in the trial, assessed in the light of the prosecutorial decision as to what charges to prefer:

“[33] ... Where the prosecution does not seek the jury's verdict for an offence not charged, the circumstance that in law the evidence may support conviction for a lesser offence does not without more make guilt of that lesser offence an issue in the trial. Fairness in such a case may favour that the accused's chances of outright acquittal on the issues joined not be jeopardised by the trial judge's decision to leave an alternative verdict.”

And

“[37] ... The view that it is the duty of the trial judge to invite the jury to determine the accused's guilt of an included offence at a trial at which the prosecution has elected not to do so is incompatible with the separation of [the judicial and prosecutorial] functions. It is not the function of the trial judge to prevent the acquittal of the accused should the prosecution fail to prove guilt of the offence, or offences, upon which it seeks the jury's verdict. ...”

That is to say, judges shouldn’t be surrogate prosecutors. It is for the prosecutor to say at trial, and at a stage of the trial when it is fair to do so, whether conviction is sought for any included offence.

Friday, February 28, 2014

The power to consent to search: a question of law or of fact?

One occasionally wonders how those who wrote the Fourth Amendment to the “Constitution for the United States of America” would have decided issues that currently come before the Supreme Court relating to the right of the people to be secure against unreasonable searches and seizures.

Minute examination by the Supreme Court of the implications of the facts of individual cases has reduced the extent to which people in the United States are protected by the Fourth Amendment.

This week the reduction in protection continued: Fernandez v California USSC No 12-7822, 25 February 2014. The issue was whether a co-tenant could give the police consent to the search of the residence she shared with the defendant. The defendant had been lawfully arrested and removed, but he had maintained his objection to the search. The police could have obtained a warrant but did not, and in giving consent to the search when the police returned to the residence about an hour after removing the defendant, she may have felt pressured (Ginsburg J dissenting, joined by Sotomayor and Kagan JJ, p 9 slip op, footnote 5; but compare footnote 2 of the opinion of the Court delivered by Alito J). The majority held that her oral and signed consent gave the police authority to search the premises, and evidence linking the defendant to a robbery was admissible.

The legal question was whether the co-tenant could give “effective” consent to the search. This – the “could” part - is a question of law. Hence the subtle jurisprudence discussing whether particular facts give rise to an occupier’s power to give consent despite the objection or absence of another occupier.

Would it be simpler – in those jurisdictions where it is still possible to do so - to treat the existence of a power to give consent as a question of fact?

For example, s 94(c) of the Search and Surveillance Act 2012 [NZ] reads:

“A search by consent is unlawful if— ... (c) the search is undertaken in reliance on a consent given by a person who does not have authority to give that consent.”

Currently it is regarded as “arguable” that a tenant is unable to consent to the search of the part of the premises (such as a bedroom) solely occupied by another tenant: Adams on Criminal Law, at [SS94.02]. I would go further and say that the argument would be about the facts only: whether the facts show that one co-tenant had given another the power to give consent to the search of that part of the premises.

By what can only be a happy coincidence, the requirement for "authority" in s 94(c) resonates with a remark by Roberts CJ in Georgia v Randolph, 547 US 103 (2006) (dissenting, joined by Scalia J): "A warrantless search is reasonable if police obtain the voluntary consent of a person authorized to give it." But the court's jurisprudence illustrates how this simple idea has been clogged with legal rules. For example Chief Justice Roberts, in the passage immediately preceding the sentence just quoted, summarised the precedents as including the proposition of law that " ... someone who shares a place with another cannot interpose an objection when that person decides to grant access to the police ...". I would argue that this should not be a proposition of law, but rather it should be a question of fact in each case whether a relevant occupier (the defendant) has given authority to another occupier to give consent to the search that actually occurred.

In Fernandez there was no such consent and the absence of the defendant, who was in police custody, did not  result in him constructively giving his authority to consent to the co-tenant, and obviously, as there was then no urgency, the police should have obtained a warrant; the search was illegal and the admissibility of the seized evidence should be determined taking that illegality into account.

Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Evaluating opinions

R v Sekhon, 2014 SCC 15 (20 February 2014) is interesting on when an expert’s opinion has no probative value, and on the appellate court’s approach to assessing the inevitability of a guilty verdict.

An expert witness said that in his extensive experience drug couriers always know that they are in possession of a drug. They are not “blind” couriers. The material issue was the defendant’s knowledge of the presence of a drug in the vehicle he drove at the Canadian border.

The expert’s evidence here cannot readily be reduced to the necessary logical proposition that constitutes the likelihood ratio that expresses probative value.

To determine probative value it is necessary to know whether the evidence is more consistent with the defendant’s guilt than with the defendant’s innocence.

At first blush it seems that this evidence is indeed of that kind: it carries the implication that the defendant must have known of the presence of the drug. But that, without more, is fallacious, for it is simply saying that other defendants in other cases have known of the presence of the drug, so this defendant must have known too.

To determine whether the evidence is more consistent with the defendant’s guilt than with the defendant’s innocence, one asks how likely it is to have been obtained on the assumption that the defendant is guilty, compared to how likely it is to have been obtained on the assumption that the defendant is innocent.

Here the expert’s opinion doesn’t fit into that formula. If the opinion comes down to saying “the defendant knew the drug was present”, it is conclusory not probative.

This sort of analysis is important, for at trial there was no objection to the evidence being given. Not only did counsel not object to it, but at this judge-alone trial the judge accepted it, and the British Columbia Court of Appeal majority (Newbury JA dissenting) also thought it was admissible. But all the Supreme Court judges in Sekhon held that the expert’s opinion was not admissible [49] – [50], [61], [75] – [76], [79] – [80].

The other interesting aspect of Sekhon is the split in the Supreme Court over whether this was a case in which the conviction could be upheld by application of the proviso. This sort of split arises from different evaluations of the strength of the prosecution case as it would have been if the inadmissible evidence hadn’t been given. Here the trial judge gave a reasoned decision, so it should have been relatively easy to evaluate the strength of the case without the impugned evidence. Jury trial convictions are, broadly speaking, more easily overturned when inadmissible evidence was led at trial, because the appellate court cannot examine the reasoning of the jury and there are more live possibilities for how the reasoning may have proceeded in the absence of the error. Differences in appellate perceptions of the significance of such errors at trial point to a weakness in the criteria for deciding conviction appeals.

Monday, February 24, 2014

The Canadian slant on trial fairness and the stay of proceedings

When prosecution misconduct imperils the fairness of a trial, and no other remedy can be found to eliminate any real risk that the trial will be unfair, it is the duty of the judge to stay the proceedings.

This is a corollary of the defendant’s absolute right to a fair trial. If there is a real risk that the trial will be unfair, there is no next-step of balancing the public interest in proceeding against the defendant’s interest in trial fairness.

There are two sorts of relevant prejudice that can arise from the misconduct of officials. In Canada they are described as follows. The first, the main category, is prejudice to the defendant’s right to a fair trial. The second or residual category is prejudice to the integrity of the judicial process, and here it is necessary for the judge to consider whether allowing the proceedings to continue would lend judicial condonation to the impugned conduct.

One may wonder whether the Supreme Court of Canada thinks that the defendant’s right to a fair trial is an absolute right (and see R v NS, discussed here on 20 December 2012). In an obiter error it has said that, if it is uncertain that a stay of proceedings is warranted as a response to prejudice to trial fairness that cannot be remedied in any other way, the judge must balance the interests of the defendant against the interests of society in proceeding with the prosecution: R v Babos, 2014 SCC 16 (21 February 2014), at [32] – [33] (and subject to [40] quoted below), purporting to follow R v Regan, 2002 SCC 12 (14 February 2002) at [54], [57].

I say “error” and “purporting” because in Regan, where the Court split 5 – 4 on the facts, the majority attached the balancing exercise as a final consideration in relation to prejudice in the “residual” category, that is, the category that does not include trial unfairness. No balancing was required in relation to the main category, trial unfairness. That was a correct application of Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration) v Tobiass, 1997 CanLII 322 (SCC) at [91] – [92], which plainly concerned the residual category of occasions where impropriety by officials may give rise to prejudice to the integrity of the judicial process. There was no authority for applying balancing to the main, trial fairness, category of prejudice.

This point could be overlooked, for the majority in Babos said at [40]:

“ ... When the main category [trial fairness] is invoked, it will often be clear by the time the balancing stage has been reached that trial fairness has not been prejudiced or, if it has, that another remedy short of a stay is available to address the concern.  In those cases, no balancing is required.  In rare cases, it will be evident that state conduct has permanently prevented a fair trial from taking place.  In these “clearest of cases”, the third and final balancing step will often add little to the inquiry, as society has no interest in unfair trials.”

Requiring the “clearest of cases” before dispensing with the balancing exercise is hardly a protection of the defendant against a real risk of an unfair trial. The embarrassment could be avoided if one were to pretend that a “real risk” is the same thing as “the clearest of cases”. But it isn’t. Does society have an interest in proceeding with trials that may well be unfair, and only staying those which must be unfair?

In Babos Abella J dissented on the assessment of the prejudice to the integrity of the judicial process in this case. She did not mention the trial fairness category of prejudice.

The critical misconduct in Babos was threats by a prosecutor that the defendant would face more charges if a guilty plea was not entered [10], [59] – [71]. The level of residual prejudice that these gave rise to must be assessed in the circumstances of the case. It was significant here that a threat had occurred before the defendant had obtained sufficient disclosure to make an informed decision as to plea. Even so, there were circumstances that reduced the prejudice, and on balance the majority concluded that a stay was not warranted.

Sunday, February 23, 2014

Two occasions for caution: dock identification, and witnesses who may have an improper motive

Where a witness has had an opportunity at an identification parade to identify the defendant but has failed to do so, the prosecutor should not invite the witness to identify the defendant in the dock at trial, and should be at pains to avoid a dock identification: Lawrence v The Queen (Jamaica) [2014] UKPC 2 (11 February 2014) at [11].

The Board summarised its dicta in previous cases on dock identification and the warnings that must be given by a trial judge when they are permitted, applying in particular Holland v HM Advocate [2005] UKPC D1, mentioned here on 26 February 2008 in relation to Pipersburgh v R (Belize) [2008] UKPC 11, and again here on 26 April 2006 in relation to Edwards v R (Jamaica) [2006] UKPC 23.

There is also in Lawrence a summary of the law on when the judge should warn the jury that a witness’s evidence may be tainted by an improper motive. These warnings need to be tailored to the circumstances of the case and the overriding rule is that the defence must be put fairly and adequately [15] – [18].

Saturday, February 22, 2014

Provocation and law

For an interesting authoritative – subject to statutory variation - survey of the law of provocation, see Daniel v The State (Trinidad and Tobago) [2014] UKPC 3 (13 February 2014).

The partial defence of provocation has been repealed in some jurisdictions, including mine, making it difficult for me to get up enthusiasm for a detailed discussion. This mental sluggishness might also be found in students who no longer encounter what was an intellectually stimulating part of the criminal law course. Still, law wasn’t invented to amuse lawyers, was it?

What would be interesting to discover, in places where there is no longer a partial defence of provocation, is whether juries are nevertheless instinctively applying something similar – perhaps a commonsense feeling for justice? – and returning verdicts of guilty of manslaughter instead of murder in cases where the result would have been the same if the law of provocation had applied.

There is, in Daniel, the generally important point that [13], [56] the judge must leave defences to the jury if they are available on the evidence, even if the defendant has not relied on them. See also Holt, discussed here on 21 February 2014.

Harmony was found [33] with the Supreme Court of Canada’s conclusion on self-induced provocation in Cairney v The Queen [2013] SCC 55, mentioned briefly here on 1 November 2013.

Is a partial defence of provocation inconsistent with the so-called felony murder rule whereby a killing in the course of the commission of certain offences is automatically murder regardless of the defendant’s intention? The answer [46] is yes, the felony murder rule (again, in jurisdictions where it or its equivalent applies) makes the defendant’s state of mind irrelevant and there is no room for the defendant to say he acted under provocation.

The Board in Daniel swept away [57] the Camplin rule which had required provocation to be left to a jury if there was evidence of loss of self-control regardless of whether any reasonable jury could possibly find that a reasonable person with the defendant’s characteristics would have responded as the defendant did. In enacting the legislation under which Camplin was decided, “it was not the intention of Parliament to legitimise a perverse verdict.”

This sort of perversity – acquitting where there is insufficient evidence to support a defence – is different from the sort of perversity where the jury recognises a defence which the law has purported to remove. In the latter, the jury is applying social norms that it considers to be morally right. These norms it regards as morally binding and therefore justly applied, although one may doubt whether that is an application of law (see generally, John Gardner, Law as a Leap of Faith, 2012 OUP, reviewed here on 6 July 2013). Arguably it is, because it is permitted by the law; through the concept of reasonableness natural laws are incorporated into positive law.

Friday, February 21, 2014

And what are our fees from crime?

What does a judge need to consider at trial if a defendant’s evidence is not accepted?

“The case in which a defendant advances a defence which may well be disbelieved imposes a particularly acute duty on the trial judge. It is essential that he consider carefully what the position will be if the defendant's account is indeed rejected. Sometimes the result will be that the only proper verdict will be guilty, and indeed sometimes this may be expressly conceded on the defendant's behalf. But very often it will be necessary for the jury to be required to apply its mind to the remaining steps to conviction, and it is especially important that it be reminded that it must do so because defence counsel will normally not have addressed other possible obstacles to conviction which are inconsistent with the case being advanced by the defendant in evidence. A simple instance is the defendant accused of murder who advances an alibi which is seriously damaged in cross examination of the several witnesses, but whose actions, assuming that he was indeed the culprit, may not amount to murder, for example because there is a genuine decision to be made about intent. There are many other examples.”

Holt v Her Majesty’s Attorney General on behalf of the Queen (Isle of Man) [2014] UKPC 4 (19 February 2014) at [24]. Compare Huynh v The Queen [2013] HCA 6 discussed here on 15 March 2013 for situations where getting to the real issues in a complex case is appropriate. And on considering defences not expressly relied on, see R v Pickton 2010 SCC 32, discussed here on 6 August 2010.

Holt will be of interest to all lawyers who receive funds or property from clients. A cynic might say that the creation of money laundering and proceeds of crime offences gives the Crown an unfair advantage in the scramble for revenue. But we who take a more balanced view would agree that it would not be possible to prevent offenders from benefiting from their offences if lawyers were exempt from proceeds of crime laws.

In Holt the key issue was whether the defendant, a lawyer, had known or suspected that funds were the proceeds of crime. This requirement of knowing or suspecting is commonly found in proceeds of crime legislation.

“[25] ... It would not be necessary for the appellant to know that the law labelled what occurred a crime, still less which crime, if she knew or suspected facts which amounted to a crime of some kind. But it was necessary for the prosecution to prove that she had applied her mind to the circumstances in which the money had been produced. Actual knowledge or suspicion that there was criminal conduct of some kind involved is an essential element of the offence. It was not enough to show that she ought to have realised that some crime, such as theft or obtaining by deception, might well have been involved. Knowledge or suspicion that to receive the money ... would be irregular, in the sense of a breach of trust, is not automatically the same as knowledge or suspicion that a crime is involved.”

And in the circumstances here, even agreeing in cross-examination that she knew the money couldn’t have “honestly” been obtained by the client, did not necessarily amount to admitting knowledge of more than an irregularity that was less than a crime. The issue of knowledge or suspicion that the money was proceeds of crime had not been left to the jury in this trial, the defence having been absence of knowledge of the source of the money rather than its quality as proceeds of crime.

“[26] It is no answer to this defect [omission of a direction on the need to prove knowledge or suspicion that the money was proceeds of crime] that the appellant was not advancing this defence, either in her evidence or in counsel's speech on her behalf. It is precisely because she was advancing a different, and as the jury found untruthful, version of events, that neither she nor counsel did so. It is precisely in these circumstances that the duty falls upon the judge to address the elements of the offence if, as can be seen to be at least possible, the jury rejects her evidence.”

In the circumstances it was not inevitable that the jury would have found the defendant guilty if it had been properly directed, and an acquittal on the main charge could have led to acquittals on other charges. There had also been some unfortunate remarks from the judge (who on the Isle of Man is called the Deemster) which could have given the jury the impression that the judge thought the defendant was guilty. All convictions were quashed, and the question of retrial ([32] “the public interest is most unlikely to call for a re-trial”) reserved for submissions to be made to the Board.

Friday, February 14, 2014

The view from above

Just as cirrocumulus stratiformis clouds are broadly similar to cirrus spissatus undulatus clouds, and most of us don’t really pay much heed to the difference between them, so too is Milne v The Queen [2014] HCA 4 (14 February 2014) broadly similar to Richardson v DPP [2014] UKSC 8, discussed here on 7 February 2014.

Both cases take a purposive interpretation of specific legislation. In Milne an exchange of property with intent to conceal the profit to avoid paying tax did not make the property an “instrument of crime” for the purposes of s 400.3(1) of the Criminal Code (Cth). The property disposed of was not thereafter “used” in the commission of a relevant offence.

Not too far removed from a hypothetical considered in Richardson: the shop’s lawful activity of selling soap would not have been made unlawful if a sales assistant were being paid below the minimum wage.

But we lawyers, whose heads are definitely not in the cirrus, can see the difference as well as the similarity.

Thursday, February 13, 2014

One angry juror

The integrity of the trial process was called into question in Smith v Western Australia [2014] HCA 3 (12 February 2014). After a jury had returned guilty verdicts and had been discharged, a note was found in the jury room. It was addressed to the judge and said:

“I have been physically coerced by a fellow juror to change my plea to be aligned with the majority vote. This has made my ability to perform my duty as a juror on this panel [sic].”

The Court qualified the rule that a jury’s deliberations are private and evidence of them will not be received:

“[45]  If public confidence in the system of criminal justice is to be deserved, criminal misconduct calculated to prevent free and frank deliberation by a jury must not be kept secret lest it become endemic. In such cases, the application by the courts of the exclusionary rule to preserve finality would be contrary to the first duty of the courts to preserve the integrity of the system of criminal justice which they administer.”

There is a threshold to be crossed before the issue is opened:

“[50] A court should be careful not to jump to the conclusion that the line has been crossed between robust debate and unlawful coercion; but where there is an allegation by a juror capable of belief that an incident has occurred which could be regarded as unlawful intimidation, a court of appeal is warranted in entertaining that allegation as part of its consideration of whether a miscarriage of justice has occurred.”

Here there was no challenge to the correctness of the verdicts – in the sense that the appellant accepted that they were reasonably open to the jury on the evidence, but it was argued – and accepted by the Court – that this case involved evidence, that was capable of belief, that raised reasonable ground for suspicion that one juror had exercised unlawful intimidation over another, and “on the face of things, there has been a serious breach of the presuppositions of the trial” [54].

For those of us who have to understand the workings of s 232 of the Criminal Procedure Act 2011 [NZ] it is useful to see how it would fit to these circumstances. Section 232(4) includes in the definition of a miscarriage of justice an “irregularity, or occurrence in or in relation to or affecting the trial” that has a specified consequence. The note in Smith is evidence of such an event. It is not contended that the outcome of the trial was affected - one of the ways in which an irregularity can amount to a miscarriage of justice: s 232(4)(a) – so the argument is directed at satisfaction of the alternative consequence of the irregularity: it made the trial unfair: s 232(4)(b). The common law establishes that an unfair trial is one where the law was not properly applied to facts that were determined impartially, and here it is the impartiality of the determination of the facts that is relevant.

Smith illustrates how a verdict may be correct - in the sense that it was open to the jury to convict the defendant - but it may still have been arrived at in a way tainted by impartiality. A biased decision can be correct, but nevertheless be arrived at unfairly.

And here is a tutorial question: if a majority verdict could have been returned in this case, would it matter that the one dissenting juror may have been unlawfully threatened but still had refused to join the majority? And alternatively, if a majority verdict could have been returned, would it matter that the threatened juror had joined in the verdict which ultimately was unanimous?

Wednesday, February 12, 2014

Stop the tendering for sentence!

Overruling an established sentencing practice, the High Court of Australia held that, at sentencing, the prosecutor should not make submissions on the appropriate range of sentences available to the court: Barbaro v The Queen; Zirilli v The Queen [2014] HCA 2 (12 February 2014).

The majority (French CJ, Hayne, Kiefel and Bell JJ) held that it is wrong in principle for the prosecution to do so. An error in sentencing can be identified without the need to ascertain an appropriate range [27] – [28], and it is not the role of the prosecutor to act as a surrogate judge and offer a dispassionate assessment of such a supposed range [29]. A statement of an appropriate range depends on assumptions which are likely to be unascertainable by the sentencing judge and therefore of little use [37].

Instead, the role of the prosecutor can be discerned from the correct procedure:

“[38] If a sentencing judge is properly informed about the parties' submissions about what facts should be found, the relevant sentencing principles and comparable sentences, the judge will have all the information which is necessary to decide what sentence should be passed without any need for the prosecution to proffer its view about available range ... .”
[39] ... the role and duty of the prosecution remains the duty ... to draw to the attention of the judge what are submitted to be the facts that should be found, the relevant principles that should be applied and what has been done in other (more or less) comparable cases. It is neither the role nor the duty of the prosecution to proffer some statement of the specific result which counsel then appearing for the prosecution (or the Director of Public Prosecutions or the Office of Public Prosecutions) considers should be reached or a statement of the bounds within which that result should fall.”

Consistency in the application of relevant principles is needed, not numerical equivalence with sentences imposed in other cases [40] – [41], citing Hili v The Queen [2010] HCA 45, discussed here on 10 December 2010 (and note the criticism of the approach in R v AM, mentioned in that discussion, a case now available online so there is the link).

The majority reasoning in Barbero includes the proposition that a statement of the appropriate bounds for a sentence is a statement of opinion, not of law; this is not convincing, and it did not persuade Gageler J who agreed in the result of these appeals but dissented in the reasoning. Undoubtedly true, however, is the majority’s assertion that plea negotiations are irrelevant to sentencing: it is for the prosecutor to decide on the charge, for the defendant to decide how to plead, and for the judge to decide on the sentence [46] – [47].


In addition to stopping the rather unpleasant bidding-for-sentence that can occur at sentencing hearings, where the judge will seem to be either favouring the prosecutor or ducking the issue by taking a middle line between the competing offers, this case implicitly raises questions about the appropriateness of guideline judgments.

Friday, February 07, 2014

Using hypotheticals


Even if your own legislature hasn’t replicated s 68 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 [UK], an offence of aggravated trespass, it is worth reading the judgment in Richardson v DPP [2014] UKSC 8 (5 February 2014).

That is so because the reasoning illustrates how hypotheticals are used in judicial interpretation of criminal legislation. Correct identification of the focus of the provision [12], reflecting the legislative intent [13], highlights the central concept (here, “activity” and then whether it is “lawful activity”), and its limits are analysed by reference to hypothethicals (here, to exclude incidental or collateral or remote matters).

So, in this particular legislative and factual context, the activity was the selling of soap, and this was a lawful activity for the relevant shop, which would not have been made an unlawful activity if - all these are hypotheticals - an employee had been paid below the minimum wage [12], or if taxes had deliberately not been paid [19], or if the shop had been involved in money laundering in the way suggested by the appellant [18], or even if the selling activity had taken advantage of a war crime committed by another person (taking advantage of a crime is not the same as encouraging or assisting its commission [17]). Wrong labelling of goods sold could make the selling unlawful, but here there was no offence of selling goods wrongly labelled, and anyhow regulations required that there be proof that a purchaser would not have bought the goods if he had known of the error. These are all context-dependent and not general propositions.

Friday, January 31, 2014

Erroneous concessions

It would be manifestly unfair for a defendant to be held to a concession that was made because of a mistake of law: R v Mackle (Northern Ireland) [2014] UKSC 5 (29 January 2014) at [53].

The basis for a concession – is new evidence needed on appeal?

Where a defendant has conceded an element of liability (here that he “benefited” by avoiding a liability to pay duty and VAT on imported goods), but in law that concession was wrongly made (because he was not legally liable to make those payments), there is no need on appeal for evidence that the defendant was wrongly advised if the only evidence relied on by the prosecutor is insufficient to prove the obtaining of that, or any other, benefit [45].

Determining jurisdiction

Where a concession is made it may, in a particular legislative context, nevertheless be for the court to be satisfied that the point is established [51]. A concession about facts can provide evidence on which the court determines that it has jurisdiction to make an order, but a concession about a legal requirement is not determinative of jurisdiction.

The context here is the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 [UK] (the POCA):

“[50] It is to be remembered that under POCA the court must itself decide whether the convicted person has benefited from his particular criminal conduct. The power to make a confiscation order arises only where the court has made that determination. A defendant's consent cannot confer jurisdiction to make a confiscation order. This is particularly so where the facts on which such a consent is based cannot as a matter of law support the conclusion that the defendant has benefited. On the other hand, if it is clear from the terms on which a defendant consents to a confiscation order, that he has accepted facts which would justify the making of an order, a judge, provided he is satisfied that there has been an unambiguous acceptance of those facts from which the defendant should not be permitted to resile, will be entitled to rely on the consent. This is so not because the defendant has consented to the order. It is because his acceptance of facts itself constitutes evidence on which the judge is entitled to rely. Provided the acceptance of the facts is unequivocal, and particularly where it is given after legal advice which proves to be sound, the judge need not mount a further investigation. It should be emphasised, however, that this is because the judge can in those circumstances himself be satisfied on the evidence that the basis for making a confiscation order has been made out.”

Liability and benefit

In proceedings for the confiscation of the benefits of crime, it must be shown what benefit the defendant obtained, that is, how much he gained from the offending. The requirements for liability are not the same as the requirements for establishing a benefit from criminal activity [66], [68]. Examples are the handling of prohibited goods, or participation in a conspiracy, which do not alone establish that a person has benefited from criminal activity [68].

This case applies R v May [2008] UKHL 28, R v Green [2008] UKHL 30, and Crown Prosecution Service v Jennings [2008] UKHL 29 (all 14 May 2008), discussed here on 16 May 2008.

Concessions and confessions

You could – just for the sake of remaining alert - compare the consequences of a mistake of law resulting in a concession, with the consequences of a mistake of law resulting in a confession, discussed here on 7 December 2013. Whereas the error-induced concession made by each appellant in Mackle was of no legal effect, the error-induced confession in the (currently) suppressed judgment of the NZCA did have evidential effect. The difference reflects the law/fact distinction. Also, there are two types of fairness at play: the fairness of the trial (a first requirement being that the law is accurately applied) and public policy fairness (the balancing of interests carried out in determining admissibility).

And, to be even more alert, you might wonder - following the train of thought in the first sentence of this comment - whether the law/fact distinction is sufficiently robust to allow one to say that it would not be manifestly unfair to hold the defendant to a confession that was only made because of a mistake of law.

Monday, January 20, 2014

Stop the discussion!

The dissent in R v MacDonald, 2014 SCC 3 (17 January 2014) is so cogently reasoned that one wonders why the majority didn’t refer to it or try to rebut it.


Although I call the judgment of Rothstein, Moldaver and Wagner JJ a dissent, it is really a concurrence in the result and a dissent on an important point of law.


This is one of the annoying things that sometimes crop up in multi-judgment cases: they can look half-baked, as if someone said, “Time’s up, stop writing!” before the majority judges had a chance to say why they disagreed with the minority.


I have always thought that R v Mann, 2004 SCC 52, [2004] 3 SCR 59 required reasonable grounds to suspect the existence of facts that made necessary an unwarranted search of a person who had not been arrested. See the heading to my comment on that case on 26 August 2004.


The minority in MacDonald thought that too, as had other Canadian courts in decisions mentioned in their judgment.


Importantly, the minority focus [68]-[69] on the phrase in Mann “...reasonable grounds to believe that his or her safety or that of others is at risk ...” and at [70] conclude:


“The language of Mann thus appears to stack a probability on top of a possibility — a chance upon a chance.  In other words, Mann says a safety search is justified if it is probable that something might happen, not that it is probable that something will happen.  As this Court only recently explained, the former is the language of “reasonable suspicion” (R. v. MacKenzie, 2013 SCC 50 (CanLII), 2013 SCC 50, at para. 74).  The latter is the language of “reasonable and probable grounds”.”


I mentioned MacKenzie here on 3 October 2013.


Further, the facts of MacDonald plainly show that the officer here did entertain a suspicion, not a belief [85], and that this was objectively a reasonable suspicion but it would not have amounted to a reasonable belief [83].


Judicial decisions are not always the best way to develop the law, as the minority note [90]:


“In the end, this case illustrates the danger of leaving police powers to be developed in a piecemeal fashion by the courts.  Today, our colleagues impose a standard requiring that an officer have reasonable grounds to believe an individual is armed and dangerous before a “safety search” is authorized, effectively overturning the search power recognized in Mann and a decade of subsequent jurisprudence in the process.”


When I noted Mann, nearly 10 years ago, our legislation required reasonable grounds to believe in the context of a warrantless search for an offensive weapon, but now this has changed to reasonable grounds to suspect: s 27 Search and Surveillance Act 2012. The Act, although in some respects controversial, is at least rational.