Judicial Committee of the Privy Council
| Published date | 01 November 1997 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002201839706100404 |
| Date | 01 November 1997 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
JUDICIAL
COMMITTEE
OF
THE
PRIVY
COUNCIL
IDENTIFICATION EVIDENCE ARISING OUT OF CONFRONTATION
Williams v R
Two men boarded a bus, robbed the conductor, shot dead a police officer
and stole his gun. One of them was convicted of murder, principally on
the evidence
of
two off-duty police officers who were passengers on the
bus. Before the Privy Council, in Williams v R
[1997]
1 WLR 548, an
appeal was founded on an attack upon the identification evidence of the
off-duty officers who had witnessed the events on the bus, and the
circumstances which had led to the giving of that evidence. Next day, on
the basis of information received by the police, two car-loads of police
officers visited a street in which the two defendants and two other men
were found. Those officers were accompanied by one of the off-duty
officers who had witnessed the events on the bus. He recognised the two
men who had boarded the bus, but the men, when they saw the police,
produced guns and there was a shoot-out, in which one of the men alleged
to have boarded the bus was killed. Both the officers on the bus gave eye-
witness evidence of identification of the accused as the man who had shot
the passenger on the bus. A woman passenger gave evidence of the events
which had occurred on the bus,
but
gave no evidence of identification.
The accused gave no evidence at the trial,
but
made an unsworn statement
denying any knowledge of the murder and explaining his arrest as being
solely due to police harassment.
The first prosecution witness swore that he had seen the accused enter
the bus and sit on the seat in front of him. He stated that he could identify
him and did so by pointing to him in the dock. He had earlier identified
him at the shoot-out and the arrest of the defendant. The second
prosecution witness had not been present at the shoot-out, but he had
been on the bus when the robbery and shooting had taken place. He
identified the accused as the man who had pointed a gun at the conductor
and had then shot the passenger. This dock identification thus confirmed
that
of
the first witness. In the case of the first witness's identification, the
judge clearly warned the jury of all the matters required to be put before
it by RvTurnbull
[1977]
QB 224. He repeated that warning in respect of
the second witness and added -specifically that it had been a dock
identification and that such an identification was 'quite undesirable', for
the normal procedure was to arrange an identification parade. And the
jury's attention was drawn to the fact that no questions had been asked
as to why no parade had been arranged. Consequently, said the judge, the
jury would have to be 'very, very careful'. He did not, however, suggest
that the witness's evidence should be ignored.
Nor
did the defendant at
the trial make any such suggestion. The appellant's claim was that the
police were guilty of
'a
cold-blooded conspiracy', using the first witness as
431
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