Gorgachiev v Southwark Crown Court

Under section 22(3) of the Prosecution of Offences Act 1985, a custody time limit may be extended only where the need arises from illness, absence, separate trials or some other good and sufficient cause, and the prosecution has acted with due diligence and expedition.

Ordinary court-listing pressures are insufficient. However, the defence’s failure to object to a trial date beyond the custody time limit may be relevant. It may amount to good and sufficient cause where the parties could not be ready earlier, the prosecution is not at fault, and an objection would have resulted in an earlier trial date within the limit.

The claimant sought judicial review of a decision by His Honour Judge Testar at Southwark Crown Court on 12 September 2007 extending his custody time limit to 14 January 2008. The claimant faced charges arising from a disturbance at an immigration removal centre and had been remanded in custody. A four-week trial had provisionally been fixed for 7 January 2008 after the June case-management hearing, when no objection was recorded.

The claimant argued that the Crown Court had relied only on ordinary listing pressures and had failed to identify exceptional circumstances or consider a shorter extension. The central issue was whether the circumstances, including the absence of an objection to the proposed trial date and the case’s state of readiness, constituted good and sufficient cause under section 22(3) of the Prosecution of Offences Act 1985.

1. Application dismissed. The Divisional Court refused judicial review of the Crown Court’s decision to extend the custody time limit.
2. Section 22(3) of the Prosecution of Offences Act 1985 requires both a qualifying cause for the extension and prosecution diligence and expedition. The statutory expression good and sufficient cause is deliberately broad and depends on the particular facts. Ordinary listing pressures, suffered routinely by courts, are insufficient; a particular feature is required.
3. The claimant’s failure to object when the trial was provisionally fixed beyond the custody time limit was a relevant consideration. It could constitute good and sufficient cause where the defence accepted, or did not object to, a date beyond the limit because the parties could not be ready earlier without fault by the prosecution. The undisputed listing evidence showed that an objection in June would have led to a trial date within the custody time limit, with the claimant remaining in custody until trial.
4. The judge’s reasons were sparse, and a reference to all the circumstances was insufficient by itself. Nevertheless, the material before him showed that the case was complex, estimated to take four weeks, and could not realistically be ready before January. The prosecution’s diligence was not challenged. The judge was therefore entitled to rely on the absence of objection and the case’s readiness timetable.
5. In any event, relief would have been refused in the court’s discretion. Had the judge been given the complete listing information, the proper conclusion would have been that there was good and sufficient cause for the extension. No order for costs was made.

• Southwark Crown Court: On 12 September 2007, His Honour Judge Testar extended the claimant’s custody time limit to 14 January 2008.
• High Court (Administrative Court): The application for judicial review was dismissed. No order for costs was made.