Young v Director of Public Prosecutions
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | Lord Justice Flaux,Mr Justice Lewis |
| Judgment Date | 05 March 2020 |
| Neutral Citation | [2020] EWHC 976 (Admin) |
| Court | Queen's Bench Division (Administrative Court) |
| Docket Number | No. CO/1419/2019 |
| Date | 05 March 2020 |
[2020] EWHC 976 (Admin)
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
ADMINISTRATIVE COURT
Royal Courts of Justice
Lord Justice Flaux
Mr Justice Lewis
No. CO/1419/2019
Mr N. Corre (instructed by BB Law Ltd.) appeared on behalf of the Applicant.
Mr J. Boyd (instructed by the Crown Prosecution Service) appeared on behalf of the Respondent.
This appeal is by way of case dated from the decision of the Justices sitting at Staines Magistrates' Court on 20 February 2019 to accept jurisdiction over and subsequently convict the appellant for an offence of speeding.
The facts in the case stated
The background facts are as follows. At 10:09 pm on 16 March 2018, a Ford motorcar, registration number DK16XRV, of which the appellant was the registered keeper, was photographed by a speed camera travelling between junctions 10 and 11 on the anti-clockwise carriageway of the M25 at 88 miles-per-hour, in excess of the 70 miles-per-hour speed limit. The appellant responded to a combined notice of intended prosecution and requests for driver information under s.172 the Road Traffic Act 1988 served on 22 March 2018 indicating that he was the driver.
A written charge was produced headed “Charge Sheet” stating it was authorised by the Chief Constable of Surrey, Nick Ephgrave, and directly under that was printed “Charge date: 10/09/2018”. A Single Justice Procedure Notice (“SJPN”) was produced which was undated but indicated on its face “Posting Date: 28/09/2018” and which bore the URN 45GD1380618. It invited the appellant to enter a plea either online or by post within 21 days. He entered a “not guilty” plea by letter dated 12 October 2018. The plea was recorded at the Single Justice Procedure Court on 26 October 2018, but the case was not reached for lack of time and was adjourned until 19 November 2018 – when it was adjourned again for a case management hearing; that took place on 18 December 2018 when a trial date of 20 February 2019 was set.
On that trial date, the appellant attended with his advocate, Mr Bell of BB Law Ltd. The Court was informed that the appellant took issue with whether the proceedings had been commenced in time; specifically, he contended that the police had issued the written charge and the SJPN outside the time limit provided by s.127 of the Magistrates' Court Act 1980, so that the Court had no jurisdiction.
The legal adviser suggested that this point of law should be argued, so the Bench made a ruling prior to hearing the trial on the basis that, if the matter was not brought in time, there was no charge on which the appellant could properly be tried. Mr Bell disagreed, arguing the Crown should address the Bench first, and that – on the basis of the decisions of the Divisional Court in Lloyd v Young [1963] Crim LR 703 and Atkinson v Director of Public Prosecutions [2004] EWHC 1457, [2005] 1 WLR 96 – it was for the Crown to prove, to the criminal standard, that the proceedings had been issued within the time limit.
There was a certificate of service by post digitally signed by a member of police staff, N. Morrice, which stated:
“I hereby certify that I printed the document (reference 45GD1380618) and the documents under the same reference that the prosecution will rely on in court. These were placing in a first class post prepaid envelope addressed to the defendant at the address on this copy… this envelope was placed with others from the same court to be posted by first class post at a later date.
(Date of printing: 10/09/2018)”
Mr Bell argued that this was not a valid certificate of service since it did not state that the documents had been served and a certificate could not be produced in advance of service taking place; it did not comply with r.4.12 of the Criminal Procedure Rules, it was not admissible in evidence and, even if it were, did not prove that the SJPN had been created or printed within the relevant time limit. He also argued that, on a literal or purposive construction of s.29 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003, the written charge and the SJPN were “issued” on 28 September 2018, the date they were posted, which was outside the six-month time limit under s.127 of the 1980 Act.
The Court found that the document headed “Charge Sheet” was the written charge, and that the date written on its face was the date of issue. It also took note of the certificate, signed by N. Morrice, which gave the printing date of the SJPN as 10 September 2018, thereby satisfying the requirements of s.29(2)(b) of the 2003 Act. The Court also found that, as the 2003 Act makes separate reference to service in s.29(3), but is silent as to any date for service, the critical date was the date the two documents were issued.
After the original case was stated, the Divisional Court in Brown v Director of Public Prosecutions [2019] EWHC 798 (Admin), [2019] 1 WLR 4194 rejected the same submissions made by Mr Bell before the Magistrates in this case, holding that the “issuing” of the written charge and its service were discrete steps as s.29 of the 2003 Act made clear, so that it was not necessary for the charge to have been served on the defendant for it have been issued for the purposes of s.29.
Given that that decision was adverse to the appellant, the appellant applied to amend the case stated. It was contended that the Crown had adduced no evidence to prove the date of the written charge. The Court held that the statutory regime under s.29 of the 2003 Act did not require proof of issue to the criminal standard as with the laying of an information; that was the extra step Parliament sought to remove by introducing the written charge and postal requisition process. The Court presume that the document produced on behalf of the Chief Constable was produced in good faith. To require a witness statement from the producer of the written charge would add a step absent from the legislation and clearly contrary to the intention of Parliament to streamline the issuance of proceedings.
The three questions for the opinion of the High Court are:
i. were the Magistrates wrong to approach the dispute as to timeliness, this by way of a binding ruling?
ii. were the Magistrates wrong to accept the signature and date on the written charge without further evidence?
iii. were the Magistrates entitled to conclude that the SJPN was issued on 10 September 2018 and therefore within the time limit?
The statutory framework
There are now two methods for commencing summary proceedings in the Magistrates' Court. The first is the long-established method of laying an information; the second is by issuing a written charge, a procedure introduced by s.29 in the Criminal Justice Act 2003. In each case, proceedings must be commenced within six months of the time when the offence was committed, as provided by s.127(1) of the Magistrates' Court Act 1980 which provides:
“(1) Except as otherwise expressly provided by any enactment and subject to subsection (2) below, a magistrates' court shall not try an information or hear a complaint unless the information was laid, or the complaint made, within 6 months from the time when the offence was committed, or the matter of complaint arose.”
When proceedings are commenced by way of a written charge under s.29 of the 2003 Act, s.30(5) of the Act provides:
“Except where the context otherwise requires, in any enactment contained in an Act passed before this Act—
(a) any reference (however expressed) which is or includes a reference to an information within the meaning of section 1 of the Magistrates' Courts Act 1980 (c. 43) (or to the laying of such an information) is to be read as including a reference to a written charge (or to the issue of a written charge)…”
Section 29 of the 2003 Act as amended provides, so far as relevant to this case, as follows:
“(1) A relevant prosecutor may institute criminal proceedings against a person by issuing a document (a ‘written charge’) which charges the person with an offence.
(2) Where a relevant prosecutor issues a written charge, it must at the same time issue—
(a) a requisition, or
(b) a single justice procedure notice…
(2B) A single justice procedure notice is a document which requires the person on whom it is served to serve on the designated officer for a magistrates' court specified in the notice a written notification stating—
(a) whether the person desires to plead guilty or not guilty, and
(b) if the person desires to plead guilty, whether or not the person desires to be tried in accordance with section 16A of the Magistrates' Courts Act 1980…
(3A) Where a relevant prosecutor issues a written charge and a single justice procedure notice, the written charge and notice must be served on the person concerned, and a copy of both must be served on the designated officer specified in the notice.”
The parties' submissions
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...he gave for refusing to state a case, which deal both with Ground 1 and Ground 2. 41 On Ground 1, the Interested Party cites Young v Director of Public Prosecutions [2020] EWHC 976 (Admin), [2020] Crim. LR 854, at para 31, stating that “the written charge is a public document (…) and, as s......