Recent Book: Evidence: Cross on Evidence
| Published date | 01 January 1975 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0032258X7504800120 |
| Date | 01 January 1975 |
| Subject Matter | Recent Book |
EVIDENCE
SIR
RUPERT
CROSS.
Cross on Evidence.
4th
Edition 1974. Butterworths.
£6.80.
This is one of those
rare
books
which has attained the status of a
classic, not only in the author's life-
time but within less
than
20 years
of its first appearance. This is the
more
surprising as the
book
was
designed to meet
the
needs
both
of
practitioners and students -seldom
asatisfactory combination.
The
author
met the difficulty by includ-
ing
for
the former, full coverage of
the decided cases
and
for the latter.
agood deal of theoretical discus-
sion which he would presumably
have omitted
had
they
not
been en-
visaged as readers. This would
have
been a pity
for
Cross is
not
infre-
quently cited in the courts
and,
if
the present reviewer is
not
mistaken,
it is just these passages
that
are
referred to. Moreover, the
author
has
had
in
mind
students taking
relatively advanced courses, includ-
ing (it
may
be supposed) those of
the Law Schools in the older uni-
versities,
and
for
such
of
these
who take up law as a profession
it is an advantage to pass from
pupillage to practice
without
change
of textbook.
Notwithstanding its recondite
character,
the
work
should be of
great value to the police.
For
them,
no
branch
of general law is of
more
importance
than
that
which relates
to evidence.
The
police officer neces-
sarily encounters its complexities at
an early stage of his career.
and
a
diligent study of
the
relevant pas-
sages will enable him to secure a
mastery of
the
subject which could
hardly be gained
from
students'
guides, useful as these
are
for the
purpose of passing examinations.
Much
has
happened
affecting the
law of evidence since the appear-
ance of the
third
edition
(four
times
reprinted) in 1967,
and
this has
entailed a
good
deal
of
re-writing.
The
author
has also encountered
the familiar difficulty of covering
developments
that
have
taken
place
between delivery of the copy
and
publication. He has been
able
to
incorporate in text
or
footnotes a
number
of decisions reported since
February
1,
when
the first instal-
ment
of the manuscript was de-
livered to the publishers, 'and several
more
recent cases; down to the end
of July,
are
dealt with in an ad-
dendum. Writers of
major
textbooks
all have to cope with this difficulty
and one can sympathize with Sir
Rupert's
observation that, though
he has much enjoyed preparing this
edition,
"authorship
of legal text-
books has its tiresome aspects".
F.G.G.
GORDON
HONEYCOMBE:
Adam's Tale. Hutchinson £3.25.
Mr. Honeycombe
,is
better known
and
possibly better qualified as a
reader
of
the
news
on
commercial
television.
Here
he offers us something called
a"documentary novel", the
story
of an ex-public schoolboy who be-
came a Metropolitan detective in
the drug
squad
and
who was even-
tually accused with
other
officers
of
perjury.
Whilst never
too
clear as to which
parts
are
admitted to be fiction
and
which
are
claimed to be fact,
the reader is left in no
doubt
of
this
arrogant
young
man's
con-
tempt
for
his Commissioner
and
Sir
Robert's
attempts to eradicate
corruption
from
the
force
of
whom
Mr. Honeycombe's
hero
claims to
believe at least
half
(both C.LD.
January 1975
and uniform) to be corrupt. His
own
solutionis
an officer corps, pre-
ferably ex-Navy
and
presumably
also
from
public schools!
There
is a consummate
irony
in
the
fact
that
this
man
in his
arrogance appears to believe
that
be-
cause he was
'On
trial,
the
police force
were
on
trial: whereas
the
truth
is
that
the
fact
that
he was
on
trial was
avindication of
that
same
police
force, its Commissioner and his col-
leagues
who
he
or
his
author
are
so
anxious
to
denigrate.
This
book
may
well show
that
the
service does require of a
man
some-
thing
more
than
education
and
we
should be grateful to
Mr.
Honey-
combe
for
making it so crystal clear
by his convoluted tale!
AEOlUS
96
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