Hindrance

Stephen Miller’s solicitor when arrested for the murder of Lynette White, Graham Dobson used a local solicitor Geraint Richards to represent Miller in the interviews. His presence was a hindrance as legally Miller had been represented. Richards failed to intervene while Miller was interviewed in a manner that breached the protections of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE).

Miller was represented ably at the first trial by Anthony Evans QC, who presented the same arguments on oppression that Michael Mansfield QC argued successfully on appeal in December 1992. Evans found Mr Justice McNeill, who died before the first trial ended, in intransigent mood.

Intransigence

Had McNeill ruled as he should have done this case would have been thrown out in 1989. Instead it continued without criticism of McNeill being made by the appeal judges. Why? Judges must understand the law regarding oppression. McNeill’s decision on the admissibility of Miller’s confession was quite simply wrong.

The Court of Appeal, headed by then Lord Chief Justice Lord Taylor, was horrified by the same interviews that McNeill found admissible. He had heard the worst bullying and concluded that it was acceptable. He was wrong and so was the Court of Appeal in failing to highlight his flawed judgement on that issue – one that contributed to making this miscarriage of justice all but inevitable.

Wretched Luck

Evans was unavailable for the second trial. That almost concluded Miller’s wretched luck. Roger Frisby QC failed to argue that Miller had been oppressed in a case that is now one of the standard texts on oppression in a police station. The ‘confession’ was in. Leonard could have used his discretion under Section 78 of PACE to exclude it, but the exercise of that discretion is rare and Leonard didn’t apply it.

The jury heard the confession, but were deprived of the context and understanding of what could induce an innocent man to sign away his future for the shortest of gains and the most paltry reward – an end to the interviewing. His confession, which he retracted had the terrible consequence of convicting his co-defendants Yusef Abdullahi and Tony Paris, despite compelling evidence of innocence.

Inadequate

But there was more. Miller’s lawyers missed the significance of evidence that all but proved him innocent and was available for his trial. Languishing in the unused material was statements by Debbie Actie and Robyn Reed. The young women had seen Miller playing pool shortly after the Crown say Lynette was murdered. Those claims were never retracted.

There were trainer-prints, hairs, finger-prints, fibres and plenty of blood-staining – both that of the killer and of course Lynette’s. This meant that if Miller was guilty he would have had to have removed all traces of the scientific evidence that tied him to the flat and victim without showing any attempt to interfere with it.

He would then have had to clean himself and his clothes so thoroughly that not a speck of blood remained, but without interfering with the dirt on the white parts of his stone-washed jeans. He then had to go across the road to a nightclub and play pool without a change in general demeanour. He had to achieve all this within 20 minutes of the murder and as his lawyers knew with the IQ of an eleven-year-old child.

The prosecution case against Miller should have been laughed out of court – literally – but it was never contradicted as vigorously as it should have been. The poor performance of Miller’s solicitors and Roger Frisby QC have never been investigated, let alone censured.

Extraordinary

The extraordinary case of Gary Mills and Tony Poole is in the news again. After fourteen years of wrongful imprisonment, they were freed in June 2003 – the last seven because senior judges did not know the law or ignored it. The main reason for the quashing of their convictions was the cumulative effect of the lack of integrity of the inquiry into the controversial death while in police custody of Hensley Wiltshire in 1989.

More than four years ago they lodged a complaint with the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) alleging criminal conduct by police. They claimed that the number two in the inquiry, former Detective Inspector Trevor Gladding, had perverted the course of justice and perjured himself. Allegations of serious malpractice were made against other officers as well.

Two different sets of appeal judges: a high court jury¹ and a former Lord Chief Justice were far from impressed with Gladding’s conduct. Eventually, the Criminal Cases Review Commission also declared itself dissatisfied with the effect that several instances of police malpractice could have had on the safety of the convictions and referred it back to the Court of Criminal Appeal, which heard it in 2003.

Inadequate

The CPS referred their complaint for investigation, which was picked up by the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) in April 2004 and would become a major test of the independence of the new body. Nearly four years later it issued a provisional report dismissing the complaint.

“The investigation report belongs to Gloucestershire Constabulary and it is for them to decide what can be released into the public domain,” said IPCC spokesperson David Nicholson.

I raised eleven questions with them. He responded with: “It is for Gloucestershire to decide whether and how they answer.” To date, the IPCC, CPS and Gloucestershire Police have not answered the queries. In other words, the IPCC and CPS think it is acceptable for the bodies complained about to exonerate themselves and decide what information should be allowed into to the public arena. So much for openness and integrity.

Legacy

Their complaint was a legacy case, meaning it was investigated under the old rules, which meant that independent investigators were not used and there was no requirement of disclosure of the report. The IPCC has done itself no favours at all.

“The matter has now been concluded and the complaints were unsubstantiated,” said Nicholson. Such a comment is quite frankly ludicrous and merely emphasises the unsatisfactory nature of the IPCC.

The IPCC’s finding contradicts all previous inquiries including the much criticised investigation for the Police Complaints Authority (PCA) conducted by former Chief Constable of Durham Police George Hedges in the early 1990s.

Culture of Secrecy

The IPCC was established to counter the culture of secrecy surrounding complaints against police. This shameful decision and refusal to make its full findings public will taint its claims of independence for years to come.

The Commissioner in charge of this complaint was Rebecca Marsh. She wrote: “On the evidence available, the IPCC is not satisfied that there is a realistic prospect that the conduct of the officers complained of fell below the required standard. We are therefore minded to conclude that misconduct proceedings cannot be justified.”

And this in the case that the then Lord Chief Justice, Lord Woolf said: “Almost every aspect of this prosecution is tarnished.”

Nevertheless, we now know that perjury and perverting the course of justice do not constitute an abuse of due process of law² and that such conduct does not fall below the required standard of conduct from police officers,³ but that it is not libellous to say that Trevor Gladding perverted the course of justice and perjured himself.⁴

“We agree that this has taken a very long time to resolve,” said Mr Nicholson. “The setting up of the IPCC was because of frustrations with the ‘previous system’ and the length of time that cases took to resolve.”

The average IPCC investigation in the relevant region takes 166 days. This investigation took almost four years to reach incredible conclusions at great expense in a report that will almost certainly never see the light of day. The name has changed, but judging by this decision not much else.