R (O) v Stratford Youth court
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | LORD JUSTICE ROSE,MR JUSTICE HARRISON |
| Judgment Date | 23 June 2004 |
| Neutral Citation | [2004] EWHC 1553 (Admin) |
| Docket Number | CO/1982/2004 |
| Court | Queen's Bench Division (Administrative Court) |
| Date | 23 June 2004 |
[2004] EWHC 1553 (Admin)
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
DIVISIONAL COURT
Royal Courts of Justice
Strand London WC2
Lord Justice Rose
(vice President Of The Court Of Appeal, Criminal Division)
Mr Justice Harrison
CO/1982/2004
MR J KIRBY (instructed by THOMAS & CO SOLICITORS, CAMBERWELL GREEN, LONDON SE5 7AA) appeared on behalf of the CLAIMANT
THE DEFENDANT DID NOT ATTEND AND WAS NOT REPRESENTED
This application for judicial review is brought with the permission of Leveson J. The decision challenged is that of the Stratford Youth Court on 24th March 2004 to reopen a case which they had already dismissed earlier that day and to adjourn the proceedings to a fresh date for trial.
The circumstances were these. The claimant, having been born on 10th June 1987, is now 17 years of age. He faced a charge before the youth court of indecently assaulting a female on 15th May 2003. He was to be tried on 19th January 2004, but on that occasion neither the complainant nor other civilian prosecution witnesses attended court. In consequence the prosecution applied to adjourn the matter and it was adjourned to 24th March 2004. Again the complainant and civilian prosecution witnesses failed to appear.
The case was called on at 11:30 in the morning. The Crown, not having their witnesses, sought an adjournment. The application was opposed by the complainant and was refused by the justices. The Crown offered no evidence and the justices dismissed the charge.
A few minutes later the prosecutor discovered that, despite the searches earlier that morning made in an effort to find her, the complainant had, at any rate by that time, arrived and so the prosecutor applied for the court to reconvene, which it did.
Initially, relying on section 142 of the Magistrates' Courts Act 1980, which is effectively a slip rule provision, the prosecution applied to reopen the case because it now had the necessary evidence to proceed. That section 142 argument was, in due course, abandoned and the prosecutor then sought to rely on the court's "inherent power to reopen the case in the interests of...
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