R v Lawrence (Alan)
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | LORD JUSTICE MEGAW |
| Judgment Date | 03 November 1970 |
| Judgment citation (vLex) | [1970] EWCA Crim J1103-3 |
| Court | Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) |
| Docket Number | No. 9378/B/69 |
| Date | 03 November 1970 |
[1970] EWCA Crim J1103-3
IN THE COURT OF APPEAL
CRIMINAL DIVISION
Royal Courts of Justice
Lord Justice Megaw
Lord Justice Cantley
and
Mr. Justice Chapman
No. 9378/B/69
MR. J. PENNY appeared on behalf of the Appellant.
MR. D. TUDOR PRICE appeared on behalf of the Crown.
The Appellant, Alan Lawrence, was convicted at Inner London Quarter Sessions on the 2nd December, 1969 on an indictment alleging theft. The particulars were that on the 1st September, 1969 ho stole the approximate sum of £6, the property of Eugenio Occhi. He was fined £35 with three months' imprisonment in default. He was ordered to make compensation to Mr. Occhi in the sum of £6 9s. 6d. He appeals against conviction.
The Appellant is a taxi driver. Eugenio Occhi is an Italian. At the relevant time he was a student, 18 years of age. He spoke very little English. On the 1st September, 1969 he arrived at Victoria Station in London. It was his first visit to England. He wanted to go to Ladbroke Grove. Outside Victoria Station there was a queue of taxis at the taxi picking-up point. Mr. Occhi saw another taxi standing a little distance away from the queue. He went to it. The driver of that taxi was the Appellant. Mr. Occhi showed the Appellant a piece of paper on which was written the address in Ladbroke Grove. The Appellant said it was very far and very expensive. Mr. Occhi got into the taxi. He took out his wallet and tendered a one-pound note to the Appellant. The Appellant said it was not enough. The wallet was still open and the Appellant himself proceeded to take out of it a further one-pound note and a five-pound note. He had thus got possession of £7 from Mr. Occhi. He then drove Mr. Occhi to the address in Ladbroke Grove, where Mr. Occhi got out and went into the Italian Centre there, which was his destination. The correct lawful fare for that journey was 10/6, or perhaps a little more if there was waiting time.
Those were the essential facts put forward by the prosecution. One or two answers given by Mr. Occhi in the course of his evidence have been referred to by counsel for the Appellant and they should, therefore, be mentioned. In cross-examination Mr. Occhi was asked whether he minded paying, to which he replied: "I did not mind but it was the only means of travel". Whether that question and the answer to it advanced the matter much may be open to doubt. He was also asked, presumably in re-examination, whether he would have paid if he had known the real fare was about 10/-. His answer was "no". When he was asked by counsel for the defence whether he had consented to the money being taken, he said (his evidence being given through an interpreter) that he had "permitted". Again this question and answer may not be of much assistance in the absence of an exposition of the meanings to be attached to "consented" and "permitted". It is accepted that Mr. Occhi offered no physical resistance to the Appellant when the latter helped himself to the further £6 from the wallet; and that he did not seek to get out of the cab or to ask for the return of the money.
The remainder of the evidence related to the issue, which was the sole issue of fact raised by the defence, whether or not the Appellant was indeed the taxi driver with whom Mr. Occhi had had these dealings. The Jury plainly rejected the Appellant's evidence that it was not he and that he knew nothing about this affair. There is not, and could not be, any criticism of the direction by the Deputy Chairman to the Jury on the question of identity. That question is, therefore, no longer in issue.
A submission was made at the close of the evidence for the prosecution that the Appellant could not in law, on the evidence adduced, be convicted on this indictment, charging theft under Section 1(1) of the Theft Act, 1968. That submission was rejected by the Deputy Chairman.
The Theft Act, 1968 was enacted, as the preamble states, "to revise the law as to theft and similar and associated offences". It was based upon a report of the Criminal Law Revision Committee (Command 2977, presented to Parliament in May 1966). As is well known, the primary purpose of the Act was to remove certain notorious difficulties and uncertainties in this branch of the law which had led Lord Goddard, the Lord Chief Justice, in Russell v. Smith (1958) 1 King's Bench 27 at pages 30 and 31, to describe the law as it then was as "a law which is exceedingly technical", and to agree with a statement in an article in the Law Quarterly Review that some of the decided cases were "a public scandal both because the Courts are reluctantly compelled to allow dishonesty to go unpunished and because of the serious waste of judicial time involved in the discussion of futile legal subtleties". It is to be hoped that it will not be found that the provisions of the new Act necessitate the introduction of fresh technicalities or legal subtleties.
For the Appellant it is contended that on the evidence in this case Section 1(1) of the Theft Act does not apply; the Appellant could not be convicted of theft under that Section, under which the indictment was laid; the submission of no case should have been accepted by the Deputy Chairman and the Jury directed to bring in a verdict of not guilty. The main basis of that submission was that Mr. Occhi consented to the money being taken by the Appellant and where there is consent no offence under Section 1(1) is committed: further, even if the Deputy Chairman was entitled to leave the case to the Jury, he should have directed them, as he did not, that consent would provide a complete defence.
The provisions of the Theft Act relevant to that submission are these. Section 1(1): "A person is guilty of theft if he dishonestly appropriates property belonging to another with the intention of permanently depriving the other of it; and 'thief' and 'steal' shall be construed accordingly".
Section 2(1) so far as it is relevant reads:. "A person's appropriation of property belonging to another is not to be regarded as dishonest- (a) if he appropriates the property in the belief that he has in law the right to deprive the other of it, on behalf of himself or of a third person; or (b) if he appropriates the property in the belief that he would have the other's consent if the other knew of the appropriation and the...
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