M, R v

A Crown Court has power to determine an allegation that a person has committed contempt by disobeying its own restraint order. Under Supreme Court Act 1981, section 45(4), its powers concerning contempt and enforcement of its orders are equivalent to those of the High Court. A committal application for breach of such an order is therefore not confined to a Divisional Court.

Rules and practice directions governing High Court committal procedure do not remove that jurisdiction. Allegations must nevertheless be clearly particularised, and procedural defects should be assessed by reference to any resulting injustice.

The appellant was subject to a restraint order made in the Crown Court at Southwark under section 41 of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002. The Crown alleged that he had made transactions in breach of that order and applied to the Crown Court for his committal for contempt.

At a directions hearing, Judge Goymer rejected the appellant’s submission that only a Divisional Court could determine the application. The appellant appealed under section 13 of the Administration of Justice Act 1960. He also contended that the application should have been struck out for procedural defects, including reliance on section 9 statements rather than affidavits.

The central issue was whether the Crown Court could deal with an alleged civil contempt constituted by breach of its own restraint order.

1. Appeal dismissed. The Crown Court had jurisdiction to determine the Crown’s committal application for alleged breach of its own restraint order.

2. Section 45(4) of the Supreme Court Act 1981 conferred on the Crown Court the same powers as the High Court concerning contempt and enforcement of its orders. A restraint order was analogous to a freezing injunction. Since a High Court judge could determine an alleged breach of such an injunction, a Crown Court judge could likewise determine an alleged breach of a restraint order.

3. Rules of the Supreme Court Order 52 did not require the application to be brought in a Divisional Court. Its reservation of certain contempts to that court did not cover disobedience to an order of the court. The authorities concerning criminal contempt, including Balogh v Crown Court at St Albans [1975] QB 73 and Rooney (1978) 68 Cr App R 78, concerned summary criminal contempt and did not govern civil contempt constituted by breach of an order.

4. The court accepted the significance of the observation in DPP v Channel 4 Television Company Limited [1993] 2 All ER 517 that both the Crown Court and Divisional Court could have jurisdiction over disobedience to a Crown Court order. That case concerned an application against the media raising substantial issues of principle. In the present case the Crown, rather than the judge, had instituted the proceedings, and no comparable civil-liberties issue arose.

5. The procedural provisions of Order 52 were not directly applicable in the Crown Court. The judge had properly required fuller particulars and left the adequacy of the material, and any question of striking out, to be determined when the substantive committal application resumed.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) — in [2008] EWCA Crim 1901, dismissed the appellant’s challenge to the Crown Court’s jurisdiction and left the procedural adequacy of the committal application to the trial judge.
• Crown Court at Southwark — Judge Goymer, at a directions hearing in contempt proceedings, rejected the jurisdiction challenge and directed that fuller particulars be provided.