R v Dodge
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | LORD JUSTICE PHILLIMORE |
| Judgment Date | 24 May 1971 |
| Judgment citation (vLex) | [1971] EWCA Crim J0524-4 |
| Court | Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) |
| Docket Number | No. 1002/71 |
| Date | 24 May 1971 |
[1971] EWCA Crim J0524-4
IN THE COURT OF APPEAL
CRIMINAL DIVISION
Royal Courts of Justice
Lord Justice Phillimore
Mr. Justice MacKenna
and
Mr. Justice O'Connor
No. 1002/71
No. 1159/71
MR. N. COCKBURN appeared as Counsel for the Appellant Dodge.
MR. R. BOXALL appeared as Counsel for the Appellant Harris.
MR. A. POLLOCK appeared as Counsel for the Crown.
These are appeals against conviction. In the caee of Dodge he appeals against conviction on two counts of forgery, and he also appeals against sentence. In the case of Harris, he pleaded guilty to three charges of obtaining money by deception. On these there is no appeal. But he appeals against two counts of uttering forged documents.
These two men appeared at the Central Criminal Court on the 23rd February, 1971. Dodge was sentenced in respect of two counts of forgery to one year's imprisonment concurrent on each count, the sentence being suspended for three years. Harris, as I have already stated, was sentenced to one year's imprisonment concurrent on the three counts of obtaining money by deception on which there is no appeal, and in addition he was sentenced to six months' imprisonment concurrent on two counts of uttering, these sentences of six months concurrent on these counts being ordered to run consecutively, so that his total was eighteen months' imprisonment.
The story is a very short one, and the point that is taken is a very technical one. Harris met and borrowed money from a man called Gold, and he told Gold, in order to encourage him to lend the money, that he, Harris, was expecting a legacy of £24,000. Subsequently when that was discovered by Gold to be untrue, he said that in fact he was owed £24,000 by Dodge. I think when he was told that, Gold had just issued a writ for the monies he lent to Harris. That was said to discourage him from pursuing his writ.
In order to help Harris, Dodge agreed to the following little plan. Harris made out two bonds, one for £7000 and one for £3000, purporting to be payable by Dodge to Harris. These documents were quite properly executed by Dodge. But, of course, the statements with regard to these sums were untrue. Harris showed them to Gold, and thus reassured him. Dodge signed these documents as a favour to Harris.
At the trial a submission was made to the Common Sergeant that these two bonds were not forgeries in law, and accordingly that when Harris showed them to Gold, he was not uttering a forgery. However, the Common Sergeant overruled this submission and directed the jury that the documents were forgeries capable of being so regarded and accordingly Dodge was convicted of forgery and Harris of uttering.
Now, the point really turns on the wording of the Forgery Act, 1913. Section 1 defines forgery as follows: "For the purposes of this Act, forgery is the making of a false document inorder that it may be used as genuine, and in the case of the seals and dies mentioned in this Act the counterfeiting of a seal or die, and forgery with intent to defraud or deceive, as the case may be, is punishable as in this Act provided".
Now the words "making a false document" of...
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