City and County of Swansea v Swansea Crown Court
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | Mr Justice Hickinbottom |
| Judgment Date | 09 June 2016 |
| Neutral Citation | [2016] EWHC 1389 (Admin) |
| Court | Queen's Bench Division (Administrative Court) |
| Date | 09 June 2016 |
| Docket Number | Case No: CO/270/2016 |
[2016] EWHC 1389 (Admin)
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
ADMINISTRTATIVE COURT IN WALES
Cardiff Civil Justice Centre
2 Park Street
Cardiff
CF10 1ET
Mr Justice Hickinbottom
Case No: CO/270/2016
and
Dominic Boothroyd (instructed by Head of Legal & Democratic Services, City & County of Swansea) for the Claimant
The other parties neither appearing nor being represented
Hearing date: 9 June 2016
Approved Judgment
The Second Interested Party, B, was born on 25 August 1929. He was charged with historical sex offences, amounting to a long campaign of sexual abuse of a young family member. However, by the time of his trial at Swansea Crown Court, B was under a disability, suffering from dementia to the extent that it was agreed between psychiatrists instructed by the prosecution and defence respectively that he was unfit to plead. As a result, the case proceeded under section 4A of the Criminal Procedure (Insanity) Act 1964 to enable the jury to determine whether, on the evidence, they were satisfied that he did all or any of the acts charged against him as offences. Following the trial of that limited issue before Recorder Philpotts and jury, the jury found that B had done the acts involved in 13 charges of rape of a child under the age of 13 and seven charges of causing a child to engage in sexual activity.
Following such findings, the orders which a court can make are restricted to those set out in section 5 of the Act, namely a hospital order, a supervision order or an absolute discharge. In B's case, the psychiatrists were agreed that a hospital order would not be appropriate. In the event, the Recorder sentenced B to a two year supervision order, placing B under the supervision of Amy Beasant, a social worker employed by the Claimant local authority ("the Council"), with conditions that B keep in touch with Ms Beasant, reside at an identified care home, and submit to the treatment of a named psychiatrist. The order, which was in standard form, recited that the court was satisfied that Ms Beasant was willing to supervise B and that arrangements had been made for the treatment specified.
B was already known to Ms Beasant. On 13 August 2015, after his conviction but before his sentence, B was referred to the Council's Social Services Department because of concerns for his health and welfare. For example, he could only walk very short distances, there was concern that he was not meeting his own personal care needs, and he was extremely frightened to stay in his own house alone. In the event, he was placed in a care home over the weekend on an emergency basis, and, on 14 August, his case was taken over by...
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Finding a Willing Supervisor for an Unfit Defendant City and County of Swansea v Swansea Crown Court [2016] EWHC 1389 (Admin)
...clj.sagepub.com Finding a Willing Supervisor for an Unfit DefendantCity and County of Swansea v Swansea CrownCourt [2016] EWHC 1389 (Admin) KeywordsUnfitness to plead, capacity, disposals, supervision order, judicial review, matters relating to trial on B had been charged with numerous hist......