Richardson, R v

On a conviction appeal, the overriding question is whether the conviction is safe when assessed by contemporary standards of fairness. Those standards will normally include sections 76 and 58 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, even where the investigation pre-dated the Act.

An unjustified and prolonged denial of access to legal advice may make a confession inadmissible. The conclusion is reinforced where a young and unsophisticated suspect is detained for many hours, retracts the confession immediately after consulting a solicitor, and the police have failed to make contemporaneous records of earlier denials. If the confession was the only evidence capable of proving guilt, the conviction is unsafe.

In 1986 the appellant was convicted at Nottingham Crown Court of causing grievous bodily harm with intent. The prosecution case against him depended entirely upon signed admissions obtained in police interviews after a serious assault on a British Transport Policeman. There was no forensic evidence against him.

The appellant had requested a solicitor shortly after arrest, but access was refused until he had been charged, more than 20 hours later. The first six of nine interviews were not contemporaneously recorded. He retracted his admissions after seeing a solicitor. His original applications for leave to appeal were refused, but the Criminal Cases Review Commission referred the case under section 9 of the Criminal Appeal Act 1995.

The central issue was whether, applying present-day standards of fairness, the conviction remained safe.

1. Appeal allowed; conviction quashed. The court could not regard the conviction as safe.

2. The governing question was the present safety of the conviction. Although the investigation took place before the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 and its Codes were in force, current standards would normally be relevant. Those standards included sections 76 and 58 of that Act.

3. The denial of access to a solicitor did not automatically require exclusion of the admissions. However, any initial justification for withholding access had soon disappeared. The appellant was 19, not sophisticated, and was questioned over a lengthy period. He was held for more than 20 hours without legal advice, made admissions in circumstances he said caused him fear, and promptly retracted them after consulting a solicitor. By current standards, the admissions from the final three interviews should not have been placed before the jury.

4. The absence of contemporaneous records of the first six interviews independently prejudiced the appellant. It deprived him of the opportunity to show the consistency of his denials and of his account of his movements. Unrecorded periods when he was out of his cell added to the concern about the reliability of the alleged admissions.

5. Without the admissions, the case against the appellant was non-existent. It was unnecessary to determine the further complaint concerning the absence of a proper alibi direction.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): Following a reference by the Criminal Cases Review Commission under section 9 of the Criminal Appeal Act 1995, allowed the appeal and quashed the conviction.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): The appellant's original application for leave to appeal, including its renewal to the Full Court, was refused.

• Nottingham Crown Court: On 19 September 1986, Tucker J and a jury convicted the appellant of causing grievous bodily harm with intent and imposed eight years' youth custody.