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Criminal Law Revision Report
By MICHAEL ZANDER, Legal Correspondent.
The controversial report of the Criminal Law Revision
Committee on evidence in criminal cases and the rights
of the accused is now expected to be published next
month.
The report will recommend the abolition of the time
honoured requirement that suspects must be cautioned
by the police. It will also propose that the accused
should lose his liberty to stay out of the witness box.
Under the committee's proposal the defendant would
not actually commit contempt of court if he refused to
answer questions, but he would be told by the judge that
he must give evidence. If he refused to do so, he would
be warned that the court and the jury would be entitled
to draw adverse inferences from his silence.
He would be required to give evidence on oath subject
to cross-examination. His right to make, an unsworn
statement from the dock would be abolished and unless
the court ordered otherwise his evidence would have
to be given immediately after the conclusion of the
prosecution's case.
The present rule that a divorced husband or wife
cannot be made to give evidence for the prosecution
against a former spouse would be abolished.
The report will also recommend that the court should
be able to draw adverse inferences if a person being
questioned by the police did not mention a fact which
he subsequently wished to use in support of his own
defence, and which he could have been expected to
have mentioned at that time. The court will, however,
retain its general discretion to exclude any evidence it
thought unfairly prejudicial.
The committee will suggest changes relating to the
admissibility of confessions, to help the prosecution.
Under the present law a confession is inadmissible if the
defence can show that it followed some threat or
inducement made by a person in authority. The courts
have, for instance, held that the suggestion, " You had
better tell the truth," or an offer of bail or cigarettes
in return for a statement were inducements vitiating the
confession. Under the committee's proposals, an induce-
ment would no longer vitiate the confession if the
prosecution was able to prove that it was not of a kind
to make the confession unreliable.
The court will not propose any other change in the
rules governing questioning of suspects. Nor will it, as
predicted, recommend that previous convictions should
be generally admissible in evidence. The Home Secre-
tary, Mr Maudling, made this clear in a written answer
in the Commons last month.
But the report will propose important changes in the
admissibility of hearsay evidence and in the rules
regarding corroboration. The present requirement that
unsworn evidence of children must be corroborated
would be abolished except where the offence was a sex
crime against a child under 14 and the evidence was
only that of the victim. Also, the judge would no longer
be required to warn the jury of the danger of relying
on the uncorroborated evidence of accomplices.
On the other hand, a new rule would require that
when the case against the accused was wholly or mainly
based on disputed identification evidence, the court
would be required to give a warning of the danger of
acting on such evidence without corroboration.
The report, which has been eight years in preparation,
will be accompanied by a draft Bill. The committee was
set up in 1959 as a standing committee to advise the
Home Secretary. All its 10 previous reports have been
implemented. Legislation on this one is likely next
session.
(Guardian,
11th May, 1972).
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most gratefuly received by the Sec-
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