R v Wood
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judgment Date | 06 July 1995 |
| Date | 06 July 1995 |
| Court | Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) |
Court of Appeal, Criminal Division
Before Lord Justice Staughton, Mr Justice Scott Baker and Mr Justice Butterfield
Criminal procedure - fair trial - press influence on jury
Although newspaper editors and their readers rightly required that those guilty of serious crime should be convicted and punished, fairness demanded that pressure should not be put on jurors in a particular case by the press or anyone else.
The Court of Appeal should not act on information to the effect that the judge's manner in summing up was hostile to the defence unless such information was either agreed between counsel or supported by evidence.
The Court of Appeal, Criminal Division, so stated in allowing an appeal by Vincent Joseph Wood against his conviction in July 1993 at the Central Criminal Court (Mr Justice Ognall and a jury) of having an explosive substance with intent to endanger life for which he was sentenced to 22 years imprisonment. The conviction was quashed and a retrial ordered.
He had pleaded guilty on another count charging possession of an explosive substance upon which no separate penalty was imposed.
Miss Helena Kennedy, QC and Mr Ben Emmerson, assigned by the Registrar of Criminal Appeals, for the appellant; Mr John Nutting, QC and Mr Richard Horwell for the Crown.
LORD JUSTICE STAUGHTON, giving the judgment of the court, said that the appellant had lived in London all his life. He was a man with no previous convictions but of pronounced political views adverse to the existing government. His wife was Irish but had lived in London since before their marriage.
It was the prosecution case that in October 1992 the appellant had left a tea chest containing a Reebok sports holdall with 17.55 kilos of Semtex-H plastic explosive, five time and power units and a knife at the business premises of an old schoolfriend, Robinson, with whom he had recently become reacquainted. A partner of the schoolfriend became curious and opened the tea chest. The police were notified and the appellant was subsequently arrested.
There was hardly any dispute by the defence as the primary facts relied on by the prosecution. The question was whether those facts led to the inference that Wood had the intent with which he was charged, of endangering life and causing serious injury to life or property or enabling others to do so.
He denied any connection with the IRA. His explanation was that his brother-in-law, who lived in...
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...happened in any particular case is not likely to be an easy decision.' 69 Mears was applied by the Court of Appeal in R. v. Wood [1996] 1 Cr. App. R. 207, where it was noted that the degree of adverse comment allowed at that time was substantially less than it had been fifty years earlier.......
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...and made it very difficult, if not practically impossible, for the jury to do other than that which he was plainly suggesting. 126 In R v Wood [1996] 1 Cr. App. R. 207 this court quoted that passage in Mears v R and accepted that the degree of adverse comment allowed today was substantially......
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...out in many cases. They include those referred to by Mr McNulty, namely R v Nelson [1997] Crim.L.R 234, Mears v R (1993) 97 Cr.App.R 239; R v Wood [1996] 1 Cr.App.R 207 and R v Bowden [1999] Cr.App.R 176. In the course of his submissions Mr McNulty paid particular regard to the case of Wood......