R (DPP) v Chorley Justices and Another; DPP v South West Lancashire Justices
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | LORD JUSTICE THOMAS,MR JUSTICE MCCOMBE |
| Judgment Date | 08 June 2006 |
| Neutral Citation | [2006] EWHC 1795 (Admin) |
| Docket Number | CO/357/2006 |
| Court | Queen's Bench Division (Administrative Court) |
| Date | 08 June 2006 |
[2006] EWHC 1795 (Admin)
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
DIVISIONAL COURT
Lord Justice Thomas
Mr Justice Mccombe
CO/357/2006
MR M WALSH (instructed by CPS, Preston) appeared on behalf of the CLAIMANT
MR P FIELD QC (instructed by Freeman & Co, Manchester) appeared on behalf of the SECOND DEFENDANT
There is before this court an application against the Chorley Justices in Lancashire to state a case. The circumstances, many of which are not in dispute, can be briefly stated.
On 27th November 2004 Mr Forrest, the second defendant, was driving his car on the M6. He was involved in an accident on that part of the M6 that is in Lancashire. He was taken to the Royal Preston Hospital. A blood specimen was, on the witness statements that have been put before us, taken in accordance with the procedures under sections 7 and 9 of the Road Traffic Act 1988. A certificate of analysis, which we have seen, was subsequently provided which showed that the alcohol content in the blood was 179 milligrams of alcohol in 100 millilitres of blood; this was considerably in excess of the legal limit of 80 milligrams.
On 17th March 2005 (after a delay which is unexplained before us) a summons was issued for an offence under section 5(1)(a) of the Road Traffic Act 1988. It was sent on 22nd March 2003 by post to Mr Forrest at an address, Oak House, Highrigg Lane, Durton Lane, Broughton. That was the address that was set out on the summons itself. The summons required him to appear on 15th April 2005 at the Chorley Magistrates' Court.
It appears that on 15th April Mr Forrest attended court and it appears that the case was adjourned. On 29th April Mr Forrest attended again and a not guilty plea was entered. The case was adjourned until 9th May for a date to be fixed. It is not clear to us why, on 29th April, it was necessary to adjourn the case for a date to be fixed and why the matter could not have been dealt with there and then, in accordance with the procedure that should have been followed.
On 9th May 2003, again for reasons that are unexplained, the case was further adjourned to a case management conference on 12th July 2005. That case management conference duly took place on 12th July 2005. Mr Forrest said that he would not indicate his defence. He was unrepresented at that stage, a point we emphasise. The trial date was fixed for 14th October. Yet again, a considerable delay.
At a time (and it is important to emphasise this) which appears to be shortly before the trial, Mr Forrest had the benefit of legal representation.
When the case was called on for trial, it appears that three police officers gave evidence. We do not know what they said, but we have read their statements. They gave evidence of attendance at the accident, the use of the intoximeter and matters of that kind. We enquired why they were asked to give evidence; no-one who was in front of us in this court could give any explanation.
The prosecution then sought to adduce the evidence of the certificate of analysis to which we have referred. It was the prosecution's case that it had been served by post with the summons. They also contend that it had been handed to Mr Forrest at the case management conference. The defence objected on the basis that service could not be proved. The prosecution produced to the Justices a bundle of documents, including a copy of the summons, a copy of the analyst's certificate and a certificate of the doctor which, they said, were all stapled together and all bore a certificate in the requisite form. They also produced a special delivery slip which they said showed that these documents were all sent in one package to Mr Forrest.
Mr Forrest gave evidence. He accepted he had received the summons and the doctor's certificate, but not the analyst's certificate. The prosecutor did not seek to prove that Mr Forrest had been given the certificate at the case management conference.
The address of Mr Forrest which was on the summons was as we have already set out. The address on the special delivery slip document was given as Oak House, High Rigg Lane, Durton Lane, Broughton; it did not have the word Preston after it, and his address apparently is Oak House, Highrigg Drive, Durton Lane, Broughton, Preston, with the requisite post code, or alternatively, an address, 7, Highrigg Drive, Broughton, Preston, without the requisite post code.
The Justices proceeded to consider a submission of no case to answer on the basis that the prosecution had not served the certificate. They upheld that submission.
After the hearing before the Justices, an application was made to the Justices to state a case. A letter written by Mr Robbie J Overfield, Deputy Justices' Clerk (Legal) for the South West Lancashire Magistrates' Court, declined to state a case, in the following terms:
"I have now had the opportunity to consider the matter in detail and have taken instructions from the Justices who adjudicated and have also spoken to the legal adviser who attended on them.
Given that it was accepted in court the envelope addressed to Andrew Forrest was not complete in that it did not contain a postcode and was inaccurate because it failed to identify the correct road, the Justices found as a matter of fact that the envelope was not properly addressed.
I am of the firm opinion that this was a simple question of fact for the Magistrates to determine. Furthermore, I am also of the view that their decision was a reasonable one, in all the circumstances, bearing in mind the limited evidence, which was presented to them, on the point, for which they cannot be justifiably criticised."
He went on to inform the Crown Prosecution Service that the Justices refused to state a case on the basis that the application was frivolous.
In the application that was subsequently made to this court, the Assistant District Crown Prosecutor for South West Lancashire stated:
"In subsequent correspondence the justices have given written reasons for the decision of 14 October 2005 as follows…"
And he set out and annexed to his statement a document which reads as follows:
" Decisions
(i) We have heard representations from both parties regarding the question of whether the Section 16 certificate was sent by Gillian Sumner on 22 March 2005. We are aware that the stamp on the back of this certificate refers to the phrase 'summons'.
Regardless of any definition of this term we are satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that the Section 16 certificate which has the stamp of service on it was sent out by recorded delivery on 22 March 2005.
(ii) We have been referred to Section 16 in of the RTOA 1988 and Section 7 of the Interpretation Act 1978. This last section indicates that service is deemed to be effected by properly addressing, pre-paying and posting a letter.
Due to the lack of statutory or case law definition of 'properly' we have had regard to the three definitions contained in the Oxford English dictionary as well as the definitions of 'proper'.
The address in question is both inaccurate regarding the actual road, and incomplete in that there is no post code.
We are of the opinion that this correspondence is not properly addressed under any of the definitions available of the word 'properly'."
Quite rightly in this court, counsel who has appeared on Mr Forrest's behalf says that there is nothing which indicates the provenance of this document as the correspondence is not annexed. We will proceed for the purposes of our decision today on the basis that this represents the reasoning that the Justices gave.
The position in law in relation to the certificate of the analysis is a simple one. The objective of the statutory provisions as to the service of the certificate was to try to ensure a sensible and orderly procedure so that costs were not unnecessarily incurred or the time of valuable forensic or other experts wasted by attendance in court to prove something that was not in dispute. It is essential, when looking at what happened in this case, to bear that in mind.
The scheme of the Act provides under section 16(1) that evidence of the proportion of alcohol in a specimen of blood may, subject to subsections (3)...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Fiona James v Director of Public Prosecutions
...with Part 1 of the Criminal Procedure Rules. Applying, as he did, Malcolm v DPP [2007] EWHC 363 (Admin), in line with R (DPP) v Chorley Magistrates Court [2006] EWHC 1795 (Admin), [26], the District Judge was entirely right. Indeed, viewing the issue on that limited basis there was no real ......
-
R v Alan Newell
...the Court has ample powers including giving the Crown time to deal with that issue: see R (DPP) v Chorley Justices and Forrest [2006] EWHC 1795 (Admin) and R v Penner [2010] Crim LR 936. v) In the Crown Court the defence statement provided for by s.5 of the Criminal Procedure and Investigat......
-
Peter Brett v DPP
...hearings in this case. In The Queen on the Application of the Director of Public Prosecutions v. Chorley Justices and Andrew Forrest [2006] EWHC 1795 (Admin), decided as long ago as 8 th June 2006, Thomas LJ (with whom McCombe J agreed) said “24. In April 2005 the Criminal Procedure Rules c......
-
R v Max Angus Ensor
...of CJPO. We agree with that statement. 28 The Criminal Procedure Rules came into effect in April 2005. In the words of Thomas LJ in DPP v Chorley Justices [2006] EWHC (Admin) 1795, at paragraph 24, the rules effected a “sea change” in the way which criminal cases should be conducted. Rule 1......
-
'Proof by Case Management' and Other Myths about the Criminal Procedure Rules
...(Admin), paragraph 31, per Stanley Burnton J.. and see R v Penner [2010] EWCA Crim 1155 at paragraph 18 R (DPP) v Chorley Justices [2006] EWHC 1795 (Admin), paragraph 26, per Thomas L.J. See for example R (Lawson) v Stafford Magistrates' Court [2007] EWHC 2490 (Admin) [2009] EWHC 236 (Admin......
-
Table of Cases
...RTR 369, DC! 479 DPP, R on the application of, v Chorley Magistrates’ Court [2006] EWHC 1795 .................................................................................................... (Admin), DC" 550 DPP, R on the application of, v Evans (Brychan Gethin John) ..........................
-
Other Issues
...right to seek a case.” Application granted. CHAPTER 12: OTHER ISSUES R (on the application of the DPP) v Chorley Magistrates’ Court [2006] EWHC 1795 (Admin), unreported, 8 June 2006, QBD (DC) On the facts, justices should not have declined to state a case. (Obiter): the Criminal Procedure R......
-
Defence Participation through Pre-Trial Disclosure: Issues and Implications
...PARTICIPATION THROUGH PRE-TRIAL DISCLOSURE31 Ibid. at [35].32 R (on the application of DPP) vChorley Justices and Andrew Forrest [2006] EWHC 1795 (Admin) at [24].33 Rule 1.1.34 Rule 1.2(1)(a).35 McEwan, above n. 7 at 532. See also F. Garland and J. McEwan, ‘Embracingthe Overriding Objective......
-
The Changing Role of the Judge in the Criminal Process
...EWCA Crim 2485 at [41].22 RvKyham [2008] EWCA Crim 1612 at [152], per Judge LJ.23 R (on the application of the DPP) vChorley Justices [2006] EWHC 1795 at [24], per Thomas LJ.24 [2003] EWCA Crim allowed to defeat the submission of No Case to Answer by amending theindictment at this late stag......