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Helping Prosecutors with Their Inquiries

Document Cited in Related
Vincent
Date01 June 2006
DOI10.1350/jcla.2006.70.3.183
AuthorJames Morton
Published date01 June 2006
Subject MatterOpinion
JCL 70(3).doc..Opinion .. Page183 OPINION
Helping Prosecutors with their Inquiries
James Morton
The provisions in the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005
make for interesting reading, particularly Chapter 2, Offenders Assisting
Investigations and Prosecutions (ss 71–75) which deals with the use of
criminals as witnesses against their co-accused.
Summarising the provisions, if the DPP or other similar prosecutors
think fit they can engage in a written deal with a defendant or suspect so
that he gets a lesser sentence in return for his giving suitable evidence
against his co-accused. If he fails to come up to scratch, then he may be
resentenced.
The use of informers and the supergrass has long been a necessary, if
unhealthy, feature of courts worldwide. In England it really came into
use in the early 1970s when Bertie Smalls turned on his friends with
whom he had engaged in a series of bank robberies in and around
London. In a well-engineered bargain he obtained total immunity in
return for his evidence. He did indeed come up to scratch and his
evidence put away more or less the whole team with whom he had been
working. The Court of Appeal was less than pleased with his complete
immunity. Future turncoats such as Maurice O’Mahoney, Charlie Lowe,
and a whole host of others who had apparently seen The Light, or at
least daylight if they turned on their mates, after their arrests for a whole
series of very often unpleasant crimes were sent to prison, or at least
police custody, for a period generally around five years during which
they gave evidence. During this time they received conjugal visits, trips
out with their minders and, it would seem from photographs, alcohol in
their cells, along with television and other treats. On their release a
number celebrated their good fortune by returning to robberies and in at
least one instance became a supergrass a second time around.
Sentencing a co-accused who has given evidence, or was expected to
give evidence, against former friends has always presented...

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