Meyer, R. v

Under the Criminal Justice Act 2003, bad-character evidence which has been properly admitted may be used only for matters to which it is relevant. Prior guilty pleas to violent offending, without features bearing on truthfulness, do not rationally undermine a defendant’s credibility. They may nevertheless be relevant background evidence where self-defence is in issue, provided the jury receives suitable cautions.

A credibility direction based on irrelevant convictions is a material misdirection where the defendant’s account is central to self-defence and may render the conviction unsafe. An appellate court should not substitute a conviction for an alternative assault offence where the same misdirection may have affected the jury’s determination of self-defence.

The appellant was convicted at Lewes Crown Court of causing grievous bodily harm with intent contrary to section 18 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861. He accepted striking the complainant but maintained that he had acted in lawful self-defence and had not used a stone.

At trial, the prosecution was permitted to rely on two recent convictions for violence, both resulting from guilty pleas. The trial judge directed the jury that the convictions could assist both their assessment of the appellant’s credibility and their decision whether he was guilty.

On an appeal brought with the single judge’s leave, the central questions were whether the adverse credibility direction was lawful and whether the directions adequately explained the relevance of the convictions to self-defence. The court also considered whether, if the section 18 conviction were unsafe, it could substitute a conviction under section 20.

1. Appeal allowed. The section 18 conviction was unsafe and was quashed. A retrial was ordered on a fresh indictment.

2. The court applied the distinction drawn in R v Hanson [2005] EWCA Crim 824 between dishonesty and untruthfulness. The appellant’s guilty pleas to earlier offences of violence did not show that he had a propensity to be untruthful. Nor did they provide any meaningful basis for treating him as less credible. The direction that a person with his bad character might be less likely to tell the truth was therefore inappropriate.

3. The convictions were nonetheless properly admitted under section 101(d) of the Criminal Justice Act 2003. The claimed self-defence made the appellant’s recent admitted violence a relevant background matter. The judge’s cautions against undue weight, prejudice and using the convictions alone to establish guilt were adequate. No further elaboration of their relevance to whether the appellant acted defensively rather than aggressively was required.

4. The credibility error was material because the appellant’s truthfulness was central to the only real issue: whether he acted in lawful self-defence. It had a real tendency to undermine his account and was a misdirection of significance and substance. The conviction could not safely stand.

5. The court declined to substitute a conviction under section 20 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861. Self-defence requires consideration of the defendant’s honest belief in the need to use force and whether the force used was reasonable. That issue applies to assault offences generally, not only to section 18. The same misdirection could therefore have affected a verdict on the alternative count.

6. The court directed that the appellant be arraigned within two months on a fresh indictment for wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm. The section 20 count was to remain available. It also observed that, absent a statutory constraint, courts should impose an appropriate penalty for each significant offence even where sentences run concurrently.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) — in [2006] EWCA Crim 1126, allowed the appeal, quashed the section 18 conviction and ordered a retrial on a fresh indictment.
• Crown Court at Lewes — on 3 May 2005, convicted the appellant of causing grievous bodily harm with intent contrary to section 18 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861.