Brandford & Ors, R. v

A threat conveyed indirectly may found a defence of duress. The manner of communication is an important evidential circumstance, but not a categorical bar. Duress remains an exceptional defence. The threat must give rise to a reasonable fear of death or serious injury and be expected to take effect immediately or almost immediately, leaving no realistic opportunity for evasive action.

A person who voluntarily associates with criminal activity, where they knew or objectively ought to have known of a risk of compulsion, cannot later rely on duress. A judge may withdraw the defence only where no properly directed jury could fail to find it disproved. A judge may not ordinarily direct a jury to convict.

Brandford, Alford and Karemera were convicted in the Crown Court at Woolwich of conspiring to supply cocaine and heroin, contrary to section 1 of the Criminal Law Act 1977. Brandford had carried 121 wraps of drugs while travelling with Alford to Portsmouth.

Brandford appealed against conviction and sentence. She contended that the trial judge wrongly withdrew her defence of duress from the jury and, after doing so, directed the jury to convict. Alford and Karemera renewed applications for permission to appeal their sentences. The central issue on the conviction appeal was whether the evidence could support duress where threats to Alford had been relayed to Brandford indirectly.

1. Brandford’s conviction appeal was dismissed. The judge was wrong to treat an indirectly relayed threat as incapable, as a matter of law, of founding duress. The judge was also wrong to regard pressure arising from an intimate relationship and fear founded on a relevant threat as necessarily irreconcilable. Those errors did not make the conviction unsafe.

2. The court held that the established test in R v Graham [1982] 1 All ER 801 remained applicable. The decisive questions include reasonable belief in a threat of death or serious injury, the response of a sober person of reasonable firmness, immediacy, the availability of evasive action, and voluntary association. Indirect communication is one circumstance within that assessment, rather than a separate exclusion.

3. A judge may withdraw duress only where no reasonable jury, properly directed, could fail to find it disproved: R v Bianco [2001] EWCA Crim 2516. Although that power requires caution, the defence was properly withdrawn here. On Brandford’s own account, the asserted threats lacked the immediacy required by R v Hasan [2005] UKHL 22. She had opportunities to seek help, including by contacting the police, before and during the journey. Alternatively, if the earlier violent events were sufficient to make coercion credible, her continued association with Alford and known criminality objectively precluded reliance on duress.

4. The summing-up did not direct the jury to convict. Read as a whole, it preserved the jury’s responsibility to determine guilt and explained the consequence of withdrawing Brandford’s sole substantive defence. The principle in R v Gent (1989) 89 Cr App R 247 and R v Wang [2003] EWCA Crim 3228 was therefore not infringed.

5. Brandford’s sentence appeal was allowed. Given her single and brief involvement as a courier, previous good character, youth, and pressure from Alford falling short of duress, 28 months’ detention was manifestly excessive. It was quashed and replaced by 21 months’ detention.

6. The renewed applications by Alford and Karemera for permission to appeal sentence were dismissed. Their leading and organisational roles, the scale and duration of the conspiracy, and the aggravating features justified sentences of 11 and 10 years’ imprisonment respectively.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): Brandford’s appeal against conviction was dismissed. Her sentence appeal was allowed and her sentence was substituted with 21 months’ detention. Alford’s and Karemera’s renewed applications for permission to appeal sentence were dismissed.
• Crown Court at Woolwich: On 28 January 2016, Brandford, Alford and Karemera were convicted of two conspiracies to supply Class A drugs. On 26 February 2016, Brandford received 28 months’ detention, Alford 11 years’ imprisonment and Karemera 10 years’ imprisonment.