R v Rennie
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | THE LORD CHIEF JUSTICE |
| Judgment Date | 06 November 1981 |
| Judgment citation (vLex) | [1981] EWCA Crim J1106-6 |
| Court | Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) |
| Date | 06 November 1981 |
| Docket Number | No. 2647/B/81 |
[1981] EWCA Crim J1106-6
IN THE COURT OF APPEAL
CRIMINAL DIVISION
Royal Courts of Justice
The Lord Chief Justice of England (Lord Lane)
Mr. Justice Mustill
and
Mr. Justice McCullough
No. 2647/B/81
MR. B. WALSH appeared as Counsel for the Appellant.
MR. H. GREEN appeared as Counsel on behalf of the Crown.
On 13th May, 1981, after a trial which occupied seven days, the appellant, Raymond Mitchell Rennie, was convicted by a jury in the Crown Court at Knightsbridge of a charge of conspiracy to obtain a pecuniary advantage by deception. He was sentenced to nine months' imprisonment. He now appeals against that conviction by leave of the Single Judge. Not with standing the length of the trial the facts lay within quite a small compass. The history begins on 27th November, 1978, when Jacqueline Rennie, the sister of the appellant, opened an account with the Royal Dank of Scotland in Edinburgh. She had no authority to allow the account to become overdrawn. In the course of the next few weeks Jacqueline Rennie acquired from the bank a total of five cheque books, together with a cheque card. She then used cheques from one of the books to purchase goods in Edinburgh. On 30th December Jacqueline applied for membership of the Park Lane Casino in London. On 13th January, 1979 the appellant moved from Scotland to Bedford in order to take up employment. On 26th January he went to Heathrow Airport to meet his mother, Jacqueline, a sister, and an adopted sister upon their arrival from Scotland. Whilst at Heathrow he arranged a booking for the family at an hotel in Earl's Court. After spending two nights at that hotel the family moved to the Regent Palace Hotel, where they (or some of them) remained for three further nights. The appellant himself did not stay in London, but returned to Bedford or on occasions to Chelmsford, where he had business to transact. During the period in question three telephone calls were made by someone in the family to Bedford and Chelmsford.
During her five days in London Jacqueline busied herself in using her cheque books to obtain goods and money in a total amount of £3279, a sum far in excess of any credit balance on her account. Part of the money was acquired during the day at banks and bureaux de change, but a substantial proportion was obtained by cashing cheques at various gaming clubs in central London. Her brother was a member of some, if not all, of these clubs. The events of one evening, 26th January, were particularly striking. Jacqueline cashed cheques in three different clubs, at times which show clearly that she had remained in each club for no longer than was necessary to cash a cheque. The admittance books show that the appellant entered the same clubs at virtually the same times as the cheques were being cashed. The appellant was also present in at least one of the clubs at the same time as his sister on the following evening. On 28th January this dishonest expedition came to an end when Jacqueline attempted to cash another cheque at a bureau de change. An alert cashier became suspicious and asked the young woman to return a little later. The police were called, and when Jacqueline returned to the bureau de change she was arrested. The appellant, who was with her on this second occasion, vanished. Almost immediately after her arrest Jacqueline made a statement under caution. In essence this admitted that she had dishonestly made use of the cheque books, and asserted that she had done so at the instigation of one John McDonnagh, to whom she had been engaged. The purpose was to raise the deposit on a house into which the couple could move. The statement had concealed the fact that Jacqueline had been staying at the Regent Palace Hotel. Instead she asserted that she and McDonnagh had slept for one night in his car, and that she herself had slept rough during the night of 28th January. She had not seen McDonnagh since they parted on that day. The prosecution invited the jury to infer that she kept silent about the room in the Regent Palace Hotel because the goods which had been purchased were stored there, and she hoped that her accomplice, whom they alleged was the appellant, would have an opportunity to remove them before the police arrived. As matters transpired it was not until 4th June, 1979 that the police wore able to arrest the appellant. He was first detained for some hours in police cells at Bedford, and was then taken by car to West End Central Police Station in London in the company of Detective Sergeant Don. During the journey to London a conversation took place between the appellant and the police officer. At first the appellant denied any part in the offence, but when the officer revealed what he knew about the events of January, and expressed the suspicion that McDonnagh did not exist, the appellant gave way and made what amounted to a full confession to the effect that Jacqueline's story was true, except that it was he, and not McDonnagh, who had instigated and taken part in the fraud.
Upon arrival in London the appellant was interviewed again and then made a statement under caution. This asserted that the appellant had suggested the idea of using the cheques for the purpose of obtaining money from casinos and that he had persuaded Jacqueline to help. After cashing the cheques Jacqueline had given him the money, which he had used for gambling. After Jacqueline's arrest he had gone back to Bedford with the goods which she had bought, and disposed of them there. When the matter came to trial Jacqueline Rennie pleaded guilty to 13 specimen counts of obtaining a pecuniary advantage by deception. The charge of conspiring with her brother was allowed to lie on the file, and the trial proceeded against her brother alone. In the course of the prosecution case objection was taken to the admissibility of evidence of the appellant's oral confession and his statement under caution. There was a trial-within-a-trial, during which two police officers, Det. Sgt. Don and D/C. McCabe, gave evidence as well as the appellant. The grounds of objection were based upon the appellant's evidence that he had confessed because words used by Detective Sergeant Don had led him to believe that unless he admitted guilt the police would interview, and perhaps arrest and charge, further members of his family. He said that he was claustrophobic and ill-fitted to withstand stress. In addition he alleged that he had been threatened and that the words of his statement had been put into his mouth by the police.
The learned judge rejected this latter assertion, and it is not necessary to deal with it further. The thrust of the argument for the...
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