Referral

The Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) recently announced that it would investigate the conviction of Jordan Cunliffe. Then just 15 Cunliffe was convicted of the shocking 2007 murder of salesman Garry Newlove. Mr Newlove was kicked to death outside of his home in Warrington. A group of youths looked on.

Cunliffe was convicted using the controversial centuries old legal principle of Joint Enterprise. This was also used to secure convictions for the murder of aspiring architect Stephen Lawrence. The CCRC will begin its investigation of Cunliffeʼs case in February 2015. Newloveʼs widow, Helen, was made a Baroness in 2010. That year she expressed strong support for Joint Enterprise.

“Would you stand there watching somebody else kicking and punching”?, she said in 2010. “Would you actually think that was right to watch, even if you didn’t do the act? They were all as guilty as the person doing the act”. Cunliffe was there, but insists that he did not take part in the attack. Along with Adam Swellings and Stephen Sorton, Cunliffe was sentenced to life imprisonment.

Victimʼs Commissioner

In 2012 the Conservative peer belatedly succeeded Louise Casey as Victimsʼ Commissioner. The duties of the Commissioner is to ensure that victims are treated with the utmost respect. The Commissioner must be independent of any political partiality or persuasion, meaning that Baroness Newlove must keep her political beliefs out of her role as Victimsʼ Commissioner.

The following principles are core to the office of the Commissioner: inclusivity representing all victims and witnesses, including the most vulnerable members of our community; transparency in the way that decisions are made, business is conducted and the office operates; and encouraging responsibility through work with all criminal justice and local agencies to ensure the voices of victims and witnesses are heard and that each organisation takes responsibility for victims and witnesses.

As it says on its website, Newloveʼs role as Victimsʼ Commissioner is to “promote the interests of victims and witnesses, encourage good practice in their treatment, and regularly review the Code of Practice for Victims which sets out the services victims can expect to receive”.

The Code details the treatment that victims are entitled to receive from the various agencies. It was revised recently. Among the rights is information on restorative justice. “Victims should be put first in every case no matter what the crime or sentence”, Newlove said recently. “Crime can rip victims and their families apart – they deserve to be treated with respect and dignity by everyone involved. Although sentencing in individual cases is a matter for the courts – they still need to be sensitive to those who have suffered loss”.

More Equal Than Others

Victims must be treated with respect. Nobody could disagree, but does this apply to all victims and if not why not? We have pointed out previously that the Cardiff Five is an absolutely unique case. Not only were they the victims of a truly shocking and appalling miscarriage of justice, but also a crime – perjury. The conviction of Mark Grommek, Angela Psaila and Learnne Vilday in 2008 for that offence meant that they were victims of a crime.

We pointed this out to various agencies, arguing that these victims had been thoroughly let down. The judge who sentenced the real killer of Lynette White, Jeffrey Gafoor, to life imprisonment told him that the most serious aggravating circumstance was that he had allowed innocent people to go to prison for a crime he knew he had committed.

The Cardiff Five were plainly victims, yet they were not accorded any of the courtesies due to victims. They were not given the right to make victim impact statements before the tariff was imposed (see The Rights of the Forgotten Victims – Victim Impact Statements at http://fittedin.org/fittedin/?p=751 and The Rights of the Forgotten Victims – Undue Leniency at http://fittedin.org/fittedin/?p=753). Why not? Yusef Abdullahi and Ronnie Actie died without even reaching 50, deprived of after-care that may have prolonged and improved the quality of their lives (see A Lack of Care at http://fittedin.org/fittedin/?p=709).

All victims are equal, but it seems that some are more equal than others.