City of Sunderland Council v Dawson

Under Criminal Justice Act 1988, documentary evidence may establish the nature and alcohol content of a labelled commercial product without scientific analysis, provided the statutory conditions for admissibility are met. A court may draw appropriate inferences from the document itself. The position differs for substances such as controlled drugs, which are not ordinarily sold as labelled products and may require analysis to prove their identity. Evidence admissible under the Act may be excluded in the court’s discretion, but absent suspicious circumstances there will ordinarily be no basis for exclusion. A submission based on the supposed need for analysis of a labelled alcoholic product was therefore unsustainable.

The City of Sunderland Council appealed by way of case stated from the decision of the magistrates’ court at Houghton-le-Spring on 19 March 2004. The magistrates had accepted a submission of no case to answer in proceedings concerning the sale of a bottle labelled as containing Lambrini with an alcohol content of 7.5 per cent to a 15-year-old test purchaser. The central issue was whether the prosecution was required to produce an analysis certificate proving that the bottle contained alcohol.

1. The appeal by way of case stated succeeded to the extent that the magistrates’ decision could not stand. The matter was remitted to the justices for determination.
2. Section 24(1) of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes a statement in a document admissible as evidence of any fact of which direct oral evidence would be admissible, where the document was created in the course of business and the information was supplied by a person with, or reasonably supposed to have, personal knowledge.
3. Paragraph 5(1) of Schedule 2 gives “document” a wide meaning, covering anything in which information of any description is recorded, and defines “statement” as any representation of fact. A manufacturer’s label on a commercial product could therefore provide admissible evidence of the product’s contents.
4. The court followed the approach in Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs v Atkinson [2002] EWHC 2028 (Admin). In the absence of suspicious circumstances, there was no apparent basis for excluding such prima facie admissible evidence under section 28(1)(b).
5. The analogy with controlled drugs was misplaced. Drugs such as cannabis, cocaine and heroin are not sold as labelled products, so analysis may be required to prove their identity. That reasoning did not apply to a bottle sold as a labelled alcoholic product.
6. The court made costs orders relating both to the Council’s costs and to the publicly funded representation, with liberty to apply. Any question whether the defendant had committed the offence, including the significance of her admission that she had not asked for identification, remained for the justices.

• High Court (Administrative Court): on an appeal by way of case stated, the magistrates’ decision was set aside in substance and the matter was remitted to the justices.
• Magistrates’ Court at Houghton-le-Spring: on 19 March 2004, accepted a submission of no case to answer and terminated the prosecution without requiring determination of guilt.