R v Barry Titchener

A renewed application for leave to appeal against conviction will be refused where, having considered the relevant material afresh, the court concludes that none of the proposed grounds makes the conviction arguably unsafe. Minor errors in the admission or presentation of evidence, or isolated judicial comments, do not render a conviction unsafe where they caused no arguable prejudice or unfairness when assessed in the context of the whole trial, the available safeguards, the summing-up and the strength of the evidence.

R v Barry Titchener concerned a renewed application for leave to appeal against a conviction at the Crown Court at Luton for causing or inciting a child under 13 to engage in sexual activity.

The applicant advanced three grounds. He challenged the admission of a limited hearsay statement by the complainant's aunt, the judge's direction identifying the contested hearsay ruling, and a judicial intervention at the end of his cross-examination concerning further prosecution questioning. The central issue was whether those matters rendered the conviction arguably unsafe.

1. The renewed application for leave to appeal was refused. The court considered the documents and all three grounds afresh, and agreed with the single judge that the conviction was not arguably unsafe.

2. The hearsay evidence admitted from the complainant's aunt was limited. Its absence from cross-examination was materially mitigated because the defence received a detailed list of proposed questions, and the complainant's mother gave live evidence and could be cross-examined on the relevant inconsistency. The admitted evidence was not arguably prejudicial to the defence.

3. Although it would have been preferable for the trial judge not to tell the jury that the hearsay evidence had been admitted after a contested application, that comment had no arguable relevance or materiality in the context of the whole case.

4. The intervention concerning possible further prosecution cross-examination was a brief reference made before the jury were sent out and the issue was addressed in their absence. No contemporaneous application or submission alleging unfairness was made. In light of the detailed summing-up and the strength of the evidence, neither that intervention nor the hearsay direction, separately or together, made the trial arguably unfair.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): refused the renewed application for leave to appeal against conviction in [2024] EWCA Crim 1733, following refusal by the single judge.
• Crown Court at Luton: convicted the applicant on 4 August 2023 of causing or inciting a child under 13 to engage in sexual activity.