R v Selvage

JurisdictionEngland & Wales
JudgeLORD JUSTICE WATKINS
Judgment Date30 July 1981
Judgment citation (vLex)[1981] EWCA Crim J0730-7
Docket NumberNo. 4127/B /80
CourtCourt of Appeal (Criminal Division)
Date30 July 1981

[1981] EWCA Crim J0730-7

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL

CRIMINAL DIVISION

Royal Courts of Justice

Before:

Lord Justice Watkins

Mr. Justice Kenneth Jones

and

Mr. Justice Tudor Evans

No. 4127/B /80

No. 4128/B /80

Regina
and
Pauline Ann Selvage
and
Dennis John Morgan

MR. R. EVANS appeared for the Appellants.

MR. H. DAVIES appeared for the Crown.

LORD JUSTICE WATKINS
1

The Department of the Environment maintains at Morriston in Swansea the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Centre (DVLC). At this place records are kept of endorsements ordered by courts throughout England and Wales to be placed on drivers licences of convictions by drivers of road traffic offences. These records are fed into a computer and thereafter retained within its memory. The DVLC is informed of an order of endorsement by a magistrates' court upon a form known as D.20. In addition to recording the information upon it, staff at the DVLC endorse the driver's licence with a record of the relevant convictions and return it to him.

2

The minimum period that an endorsement remains on a licence, save in exceptional circumstances, is four years. Certain offences, including that of driving with an excess of alcohol in the blood, involving disqualification from driving must remain endorsed on a licence for eleven years.

3

When a person is entitled to and wishes to have endorsements removed from his licence he applies therefor to the DVLC. The application passes through a well practised procedure in the course of which the validity of the application is verified by, among other things, further use of form D.20. If the application is found to be valid the endorsement is removed and a record of its removal fed into the computer.

4

If at any time an enquiry is made about whether or no an endorsement has been removed an internal form called DQ1 is used to cause a print-out to be taken from the computer. This will contain a comprehensive record of endorsed convictions of a driver with an indication of whether any, and if so which, endorsements have been removed. This information is recorded on a form known as DQ4 which is sent to the enquirer.

5

These procedures are well known at the DVLC to most, if not all, of the large staff employed there and especially to those who take part in them, who included at relevant times a young clerical assistant named Mrs. Pauline Ann Selvage of Gorseinon.

6

On the 3rd October 1979, an executive officer, Mr. Phillip Jones, had cause to examine five forms D.20 upon which it appeared that Dennis John Morgan, of Birchgrove, Swansea, Richard David Murphy, of Gorseinon, and Alan Norman Acott, of Gorseinon were applying for the removal of endorsements from their driving licences; Morgan three, Murphy and Acott one each.

7

Everyone of these applications was irregular in that there was nothing to indicate that the applicant had given his consent to the application to be made and every one of them referred to a conviction less than four years old, except in the case of Acott who was entitled to the removal of the endorsement on his licence anyway.

8

Mr. Jones became suspicious and made some departmental enquiries, the result of which caused him to suspect Mrs. Selvage of having submitted the five forms D.20, seeing that Morgan lived near where Mrs. Selvage used to live, Murphy lived within half a mile of her present home and Acott was her next door neighbour.

9

He anticipated, rightly as things turned out, that if his suspicions were well founded forms DQ1 would soon be introduced into the procedure by whoever, if it was a member of the staff, had submitted the D.20s. Within a couple of weeks two DQ1s appeared. He took photostatic copies of them and reported his suspicions to a superior officer.

10

The police were informed. They interviewed Mrs. Selvage who, after a brief attempt to evade responsibility, admitted that she had used her position at the DLVC to wrongfully submit the D.20s on behalf of Morgan and Murphy and to a lesser extent of culpability, Acott.

11

In a written confession she stated that when Morgan, who is a motor fitter, was working upon her husband's van she heard him say that he would have to do some work upon his own car or otherwise get another endorsement. He knew that she worked at the DVLC and she offered to get hold of the necessary forms for cleaning his driving licence. Morgan produced his driving licence to her from which she took such details as she required. Thus informed she set the machinery in motion at the DVLC to have the endorsements removed from it. As for Murphy she came to know him when she used to assist her husband to load Murphy's bread van. In general conversation she learnt that he had endorsements upon his driving licence. Thereupon she told him that she was in a position to get those endorsements removed. When she saw his driving licence she observed that one of them included a disqualification from driving and that he had suffered another endorsement after that. So she told him that whilst she could not have the disqualification cleaned off she would be able to eliminate the last of his endorsements. She thought that the reason why Murphy welcomed her offer was because he wanted a clean licence in order to hire a van.

12

A little later on she happened to be talking to Acott when the subject of his driving licence arose. She offered to have his licence cleaned. Acott accepted the offer, although he could then have made a perfectly proper application for this purpose himself. Having described how she set about the attempt to eliminate the endorsements from the licences mentioned, she concluded: "I regret what I have done, there was no incentive in it for me, in fact, no one gained anything in the end. I did it really because they were friends and I am very sorry."

13

Morgan was immediately co-operative with the police when questioned, and in a written confession he confirmed what had happened between himself and Mrs. Selvage. He thought that it would be a good idea to have his endorsements removed, although he knew that they had quite a period to run and he was not entitled to have them removed at that time. He concluded by stating: "I realise now that I was foolish and I am very sorry. I would like to say that I did not pay Ann anything to do this and did not intend to pay her anything. It was something done between friends."

14

At the material time Morgan had four endorsements on his driving licence resulting from convictions in April 1977, June 1978, and August 1978, for exceeding the speed limit and for having defective tyres and tyres of different types of structure fitted to the same axle.

15

Murphy was convicted of a breathalyser offence in 1968 and disqualified from driving. His last conviction was in June 1976 for driving without due care and attention. It seems to have been thought by Mrs. Selvage that if she eliminated his last endorsement Murphy would be able to apply himself for removal of the endorsement of the order of disqualification. There has never been any suggestion that either Morgan or Murphy thought they were likely when they permitted Mrs. Selvage to act unlawfully on their behalf to be prosecuted for any further offence concerning road traffic or for any other kind of offence. There were no proceedings of any kind in being and none were contemplated in respect of either of them.

16

Unquestionably, Mrs. Selvage and Morgan committed offences contrary to section 101(6) of the Road Traffic Act 1972 which provides: "(6) If a person whose licence has been ordered to be endorsed with any particulars and who has not previously become entitled under subsection (7) below to have a licence issued to him free from those particulars applies for or obtains a licence without giving particulars of the order, he shall be guilty of an offence and any licence so obtained shall be of no effect." The maximum penalty for this offence, or for an attempt to commit it, is nowadays £100.

17

Neither of them was, however, prosecuted for this offence. The prosecuting authority decided to lay more serious charges than that. So it came about that Mrs. Selvage and Morgan were charged with conspiring together to pervert the course of justice by agreeing that the said Pauline Ann Selvage would unlawfully arrange to remove endorsements from the driving licence of the said Dennis John Morgan and Mrs. Selvage alone was charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice in relation to her unsuccessful attempt to have Morgan's endorsements eliminated from his driving licence and also with a like charge in respect of what she attempted to do in relation to Murphy's licence.

18

Mrs. Selvage and Morgan were committed for trial at the Crown Court at Swansea where, on the 9th September 1980, before His Honour Judge Griffiths and a jury, they were found guilty of all charges. Thereupon Mrs. Selvage was sentenced to three months'imprisonment suspended for one year, and Morgan was also sentenced to three months'imprisonment suspended for one year.

19

They now appeal to this court against their convictions upon grounds involving points of law.

20

The points fall within the framework of submissions made to the learned judge at the conclusion of the case for the prosecution. He ruled against them in so conclusive a manner as to leave Mrs. Selvage and Morgan with no alternative but to accept the proper advice of their learned counsel, which was that they change their pleas of not guilty to guilty and permit themselves to be convicted by the jury on their own confessions.

21

During the course of submissions, counsel for the Appellants informed the judge that if he were to rule in his favour it was intended that the appellants should make statements from the...

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