Eldin & Anor, R. v

An allegation of jury bias requires the appellate court to identify all material circumstances and ask whether a fair-minded and informed observer would conclude that there was a real possibility of bias. A jury acts as a judicial tribunal only from being sworn until it delivers its verdict and is discharged. Contact with former jurors after discharge cannot, without evidence of earlier contact or trial impropriety, establish bias affecting the verdict.

Jury secrecy is not displaced without an exceptional basis for investigating the jury’s deliberations. Post-verdict social contact between police officers and former jurors is seriously ill-judged, but does not itself make a conviction unsafe.

The appellants were convicted at the Crown Court at Norwich, sitting at King’s Lynn, of serious wounding offences and violent disorder arising from a confrontation at a Cambridge garage. Their defence had included self-defence. Both appealed against conviction. Karl Eldin also appealed against his sentence of five years’ detention in a young offender institution for the section 18 offence.

The convictions appeal arose because, about two hours after the verdicts and discharge of the jury, the two police officers in the case spoke and socialised with four former jurors at the hotel used by the appellants’ family. The central issue was whether that event justified an inference of earlier police-juror contact or otherwise made the convictions unsafe through apparent bias.

1. The appeals against conviction were dismissed. The court applied the apparent-bias inquiry stated in In re Medicaments and Related Classes of Goods (No 2) [2001] 1 WLR 700, as approved with a minor alteration in Porter v McGill [2002] 2 AC 357. It had to ascertain all circumstances bearing on the allegation and decide whether a fair-minded and informed observer would find a real possibility that the jury was biased.

2. A jury is a judicial tribunal and must meet judicial standards of independence and impartiality. However, its relevant function ends when it gives its verdicts and is discharged. The court accepted the evidence admitted under section 23 and was satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that there had been no contact between either officer and any juror before the chance hotel meeting after discharge. The matters relied upon by the defence, separately or cumulatively, could not lead the informed observer to infer earlier contact or a real possibility of bias.

3. Applying R v Mirza and R v Connor and Rollock [2004] 1 AC 1118, the court held that jury secrecy could be breached only exceptionally. There was no evidential basis for investigating the jury’s workings during the trial. The authority relied on by the defence, R v Udowich and Others, was irrelevant on the facts found.

4. The officers’ post-verdict conduct was extremely foolish, grossly insensitive and showed poor judgment. The proper response to an approach by a former juror immediately after a trial is politely but firmly to refuse discussion or social contact. That conduct nevertheless supplied no evidence that the police or prosecution had acted improperly during the trial, and could not taint the jury’s verdicts.

5. Karl Eldin’s appeal against sentence was allowed. A substantial custodial sentence remained inevitable for the serious public stabbing. However, the attack was a spontaneous response to seeing his father being severely kicked, and Karl believed his father’s life was in danger. Karl’s very positive progress in custody was new mitigation unavailable to the sentencing judge. The five-year sentence for the section 18 offence under the Offences against the Persons Act 1861 was quashed and replaced with three-and-a-half years’ detention. The concurrent three-year sentence for violent disorder remained in force.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) — By [2006] EWCA Crim 1904, dismissed both appeals against conviction and allowed Karl Eldin’s sentence appeal, reducing his sentence for the section 18 offence.
• Crown Court at Norwich, sitting at King’s Lynn — On 10 September 2004, convicted the appellants of wounding offences and violent disorder. On 10 November 2004, imposed the sentences under appeal.