Norman, R v

The common-law offence of perverting the course of public justice requires an act or course of conduct which has a tendency, and is intended, to pervert justice. A mere omission does not suffice. However, deliberate movements and use of released funds for an unauthorised purpose can amount to a course of conduct.

A breach of a restraint order made under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 may, without separate criminality, constitute that offence. The prosecution should ordinarily use contempt proceedings for a breach of such an order. A charge of perverting the course of justice is nevertheless proper where serious aggravating features exist, including dissipation of assets potentially available for confiscation.

The appellant was convicted in the Crown Court, following a jury trial before HHJ Belcher, of perverting the course of public justice and money laundering. She had obtained release of £5,000 from funds subject to a restraint order so that she could buy a car. The prosecution alleged that a car had already been acquired through her company and that she used the released funds, by a circuitous route, for school fees.

On appeal, she contended that the count of perverting the course of justice impermissibly alleged omissions. She also renewed, out of time, a challenge to the judge’s direction and argued that prosecuting a breach of the restraint order as perverting the course of justice was an abuse of process.

1. Appeal dismissed. The court granted leave to renew the application concerning the further ground, but rejected that ground and all grounds of appeal.

2. The offence requires an act or course of conduct tending and intended to pervert the course of public justice. R v Headley [1996] RTR 173 concerned a defendant who had done nothing. That did not assist this appellant. If the jury found that she moved the released funds through accounts and used them for school fees, those acts constituted a course of conduct rather than mere omissions.

3. That course of conduct could have the necessary tendency only if it caused, or endangered, dissipation of funds otherwise potentially available to meet a confiscation order. Whether there was dissipation or a risk of it was a factual issue for the jury. The appellant could not raise a new factual challenge on appeal when it had not been advanced at trial.

4. The court followed R v Kenny [2013] 3 WLR 59. A breach of a restraint order under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 is capable, without further illegality, of amounting to perverting the course of public justice. Although contempt will ordinarily suffice and such a charge should normally require serious aggravating features, the alleged diversion of funds released for a car to school fees was capable of being a serious breach. It was therefore not an abuse of process to charge the offence.

5. The challenge to the related money-laundering conviction depended on the success of the appeal against the perverting conviction. It consequently also failed.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): The appeal against conviction was dismissed: [2013] EWCA Crim 1397.

• Crown Court: Following trial before HHJ Belcher and a jury, the appellant was convicted on 7 September 2012 of perverting the course of public justice and money laundering. On 5 October 2012 she received concurrent sentences of four months’ imprisonment, suspended for 12 months, with unpaid work and a curfew requirement.