R v Governor of Brixton Prison and Another, ex parte Levin
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judgment Date | 01 March 1996 |
| Date | 01 March 1996 |
| Court | Court of Appeal (Civil Division) |
Queen's Bench Divisional Court
Before Lord Justice Beldam and Mr Justice Morison
Criminal evidence - extradition proceedings - computer printout admissible
Extradition proceedings were criminal proceedings for the purposes of section 72 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 and accordingly magistrates had a discretion to admit computer printouts under section 69 of that Act.
The Queen's Bench Divisional Court so held in a reserved judgment dismissing an application by Vladimir Levin for a writ of habeas corpus following his committal to Brixton Prison on September 20, 1995 by Mr R Bartle, Metropolitan Stipendiary Magistrate, to await a decision as to his extradition to the United States to stand trial on 66 charges, including theft, forgery, false accounting, unauthorised access to a computer and unauthorised modification of computer material.
The applicant, a Russian citizen, was alleged to have used his skill as a computer programmer, inter alia, to gain access to a US bank and divert funds into his own false accounts.
Section 69 of the 1984 Act provides: "(1) In any proceedings, a statement in a document produced by a computer shall not be admissible as evidence of any fact stated therein unless it is shown (a) that there are no reasonable grounds for believing that the statement is inaccurate because of improper use of the computer; (b) that at all material times the computer was operating properly…"
Section 72 provides: "(1) … `proceedings' means criminal proceedings…"
Mr R Alun Jones, QC and Mr James Lewis for the applicant; Mr Paul Garlick for the governor and the US Government.
LORD JUSTICE BELDAM, giving the judgment of the court, said that the plaintiff had contended that records of the instructions and transfers contained in the computer printouts were hearsay and not admissible under section 69 of the 1984 Act because that did not apply to extradition proceedings.
He contended the court was bound by its own decision in R v Governor of Belmarsh Prison and Another, Ex parte FrancisTLRWLR (The Times April 12, 1995; [1995] 1 WLR 1121) which had established that extradition proceedings were not criminal proceedings in which a magistrate could exercise his power under section 78 of the 1984 Act to exclude evidence.
In the view of their Lordships, if that decision was to be taken as having decided that the...
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