House of Lords
| Date | 01 July 1973 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002201837303700305 |
| Published date | 01 July 1973 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
House
of Lords
CORROBORATION
BY
UNCORROBORATED
EVIDENCE
R. v. Kilbourne
IT will be recalled
that
the
Court
of Appeal quashed the conviction
in this case (1972, 1
W.L.R.
1365);
but
the Crown has now
successfully
appealed
to the House of Lords, which has reinstated
the
conviction
(1973,2
W.L.R.
254).
The
respondent was convicted
of a series of offences against two groups of boys.
Counts
1 to 4
of
the
indictment
related to offences
committed
in 1970 against
one
group;
counts 5 to 7 related to offences
committed
in 1971
against
the
other
group.
The
defendant
claimed
that
his association
with
both
groups was innocent.
The
jury
was directed
that
they
were entitled to take
the
uncorroborated
evidence of
the
second
group
as
supporting
the
evidence given by
the
first
group.
The
Court
of Appeal, following
the
traditional
line against
'mutual
corroboration'
quashed
the
conviction,
but
the
House
of Lords
has held
that
the
conviction was proper, on
the
ground
that
the
sworn evidence of a child victim
may
be
corroborated
by
the
evidence of
another
child victim of an alleged similar
act
of
misconduct, where
that
evidence is otherwise admissible
and
is
relevant
and
probative of
the
facts in dispute.
Thus,
within a
matter
of weeks, following R. v. Hester (1972, 3
W.L.R.
910),
the
House has been afforded
another
opportunity of making
an
important
statement of the law relating to corroboration.
In
Kilbourne's case (supra), there was police evidence of
an
admission by
the
defendant
that
amounted
to corroboration;
but
the
prosecution asked
the
trial
judge
to invite
the
jury
to
regard
the
evidence of
each
boy as corroboration of
that
of
the
others.
To
part
of this request the
judge
agreed.
He
directed
the
jury
not
to use
the
evidence of
anyone
boy in either
group
to reinforce
that
of
any
other
boy in
that
group
(presumably
because
the
boys
in
each
group
were well known to
each
other
and
might
have
concocted a
tale).
But
the
jury
were directed
that
the
evidence
of
the
boys in
Group
2could be
regarded
as reinforcing
that
of
any
of
the
boys in
Group
1.
The
Court
of
Appeal
held
that
this
evidence was admissible evidence because of
the
striking similarity
of
the
acts deposed
to;
but,
following R. v. Sims (1946, K.B. 531,
544),
it held
that
there was nothing mutually corroborative in this
195
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