Scots Criminal Law – Seán Crossan's Scots Law

Sex or gender?

Sex or gender: which term do you prefer? Can they be used inter-changeably?

These questions have now come into sharp focus as a result of an amendment to the Forensic Medical Services (Victims of Sexual Offences) (Scotland) Bill.

Our understanding of the terms “sex” and “gender” may now have to evolve as a result of the debate surrounding aspects of the Bill, but before we discuss this Bill it’s worth looking at the current legal position surrounding gender recognition issues.

The Equality Act 2010

Section 11(1) of the Equality Act 2010 defines a person’s “sex” in the following terms:

In relation to the protected characteristic of sex — a reference to a person who has a particular protected characteristic is a reference to a man or to a woman

In other words, current UK equality law means that your sex is determined at birth when you will be categorised as ‘Male’ or ‘Female’ and this will be entered on your birth certificate. We, therefore, do not have a choice about our sex when we are born. It is a matter of biology.

What about a person’s gender? Section 7(1) of the Equality Act 2010 provides us with guidance on this matter:

A person has the protected characteristic of gender reassignment if the person is proposing to undergo, is undergoing or has undergone a process (or part of a process) for the purpose of reassigning the person’s sex by changing physiological or other attributes of sex.

The Gender Recognition Act 2004

In April 2005, the Gender Recognition Act 2004 came into force. This Act, which received the Royal Assent on 1 July 2004, currently provides people who have undergone gender reassignment procedures with legal recognition in relation to their newly acquired gender identity. The legislation applies across the United Kingdom and was passed by the Westminster Parliament.

Legal recognition of a person’s decision to reassign the sex or gender they have had from birth will follow from the issuing of a full gender recognition certificate by a Gender Recognition Panel. The individual applying for such a certificate must be able to satisfy certain criteria – the most important criterion will centre around the submission of medical evidence of physiological changes by the applicant.

The Scottish Government was intending to reform the 2004 Act, but in the teeth of strong opposition within the Scottish National Party, such proposals have been dropped for the time being.

Self-identification

Under the Scottish Government’s proposals, an individual would have been permitted effectively to self-identify as a person of the opposite sex without having to undergo invasive medical procedures and provide the evidence of this fact in order to obtain recognition from the Panel.

This meant that an individual wishing to undergo gender reassignment in Scotland would have to have met the following criteria:

A statutory declaration to the effect that they have decided to change gender or sex;
The declaration will contain a statement that the individual has been living as a man or a woman for at a minimum of 3 months;
The individual will have to undertake a compulsory or mandatory period of 3 months to reflect on the decision to undergo gender reassignment (no gender recognition certificate will be issued until this period has been completed).

Forensic Medical Services (Victims of Sexual Offences) (Scotland) Bill

This Bill has proved to be another flashpoint in the often fierce debate over gender recognition.

The Bill, which passed Stage 3 in the Scottish Parliament on Thursday 10 December 2020, has reignited the debate about the terms “sex” and “gender” and their use in legislation.

The Bill passes Stage 3 in the Scottish Parliament

The purpose of the Bill is set out below:

“… to improve the experience, in relation to forensic medical services, of people who have been affected by sexual crime. It does this by providing a clear statutory duty for health boards to provide forensic medical examinations to victims and to ensure that an individual’s healthcare needs are addressed in a holistic way in the context of any such examination (or where such an examination is not proceeded with). As well as placing a duty on health boards to provide forensic medical examinations when a victim is referred for such an examination by the police, the Bill allows victims to “self-refer”. Self-referral means that a victim can request a forensic medical examination without having reported an incident to the police. The Bill provides a statutory framework for the retention by health boards of samples obtained during a forensic medical examination, which may support any future criminal investigation or prosecution. In self-referral cases, this allows the victim time to decide whether to make a police report.”

A controversial amendment?

At first glance, no one could possibly object to the aims of the Bill, but Johann Lamont MSP, a former leader of the Scottish Labour Party, saw an opportunity to introduce an amendment to the Bill.

Such a development is not an unusual practice for parliamentarians to introduce amendments to Bills proceeding through Parliament. The introduction of amendments to Bills often permit reform to earlier pieces of legislation. In this case, the Lamont amendment was directed towards changing the wording of Section 9(2) of the Victims and Witnesses (Scotland) Act 2014.

As things currently stand, Section 9(2) of the 2014 Act states that:

Before a medical examination of the person in relation to the complaint is carried out by a registered medical practitioner in pursuance of section 31 of the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Act 2012, the constable must give the person an opportunity to request that any such medical examination be carried out by a registered medical practitioner of a gender specified by the person.

This could mean, under current law, that a victim of a sexual assault e.g. a biological or cis woman might have to undergo an examination by a medical professional who is a transgender female.

The Lamont amendment (which has now been accepted overwhelmingly by the Scottish Parliament) will ensure that the word “gender” will be replaced with the word “sex”.

Johann Lamont’s amendment will remove an anomaly in the law which currently permits a transgender person who is a medical professional to examine a victim of a sexual assault.

Further controversy

When one flashpoint is resolved, another disagreement about sex and gender is never far away in Scotland.

An organisation called forwomen.scot is raising a legal action in the Court of Session in Edinburgh for the express purpose of challenging the Scottish Government’s attempt to redefine the word ‘woman’ (see below):

“… We are challenging the Scottish Ministers over the redefinition of “woman” in the Gender Representation on Public Boards (Scotland) Act 2018 which we believe is outside the legislative competency of the Scottish Parliament under the Scotland Act 1998 and in contravention of the Scottish Ministers’ duties under equality legislation… The new definition includes some men, while, remarkably, excluding some women. This cannot be allowed to stand… The Equality Act 2010 states that a woman is “a female of any age” and maintaining this definition is key to maintaining women’s rights and protections in law…”

forwomen.scot describes rationale on its website in the following terms:

– sex is immutable and is a protected characteristic;
– women are entitled to privacy, dignity, safety and fairness;
– women’s rights should be strengthened.

https://forwomen.scot

All quiet on the Western Front? Hardly … expect this issue to run and run.

Copyright Seán J Crossan, 4 February 2021

The love that dared not speak its name

Thanks to @ChouetteLaura for making this photo available freely on @unsplash 🎁

Every day is supposedly a school day and I have just learned that, 125 years ago today, Oscar Wilde, Victorian poet and novelist, began a sentence for 2 years’ imprisonment for the crime of gross indecency in terms of Section 11 of the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act 1885.

This was the culmination of several legal actions in which Wilde had become embroiled in order to end speculation about his sexual orientation. Although married and being the father of two children, Wilde had a secret: he was a gay man living in a very hostile environment.

It was such a hostile environment that Professor Dominic Janes of Keele University (and author of Oscar Wilde Prefigured: Queer Fashioning and British Caricature, 1750-1900) (University of Chicago Press, 2016) states that:

“Britain had some of the strongest anti-homosexuality laws in Europe … The death penalty was in place until 1861 [the last execution took place in 1835]. In general, one of the main images of what we’d call a gay or queer man was a sexual predator of younger men. Many people would have also been informed by religious arguments from the Old Testament.”

When Wilde’s ‘sexual transgressions’ with a number of younger men were finally exposed in court due, in a large part, to the work of a private detective, he didn’t really stand a chance against the ensuing moral outrage of Victorian society.

The trials and eventual prison sentence would ruin Wilde financially and reputationally – for good (or so it seemed at the time).

More information about the trials of Oscar Wilde can be found in an article which appeared in The Independent to mark the 125th anniversary of his downfall.

https://edition.independent.co.uk/editions/uk.co.independent.issue.250520/data/9525296/index.html

The long and winding road

If Victorian society was uniformly unforgiving and scornful of Wilde in 1895, contemporary British society has certainly rehabilitated his reputation. There is now almost universal agreement that Wilde was the victim of oppressive laws and social attitudes.

Wilde himself would probably be astounded at the amount of progress that members of the LBGTQI community have made in the intervening 125 years.

I’m also sure that he would be delighted to know that he is still the focus of discussion in 2020 (“There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.”).

It has been a a long and winding road for members of the LBGTI community to achieve legal recognition and protection.

Before the introduction of the Scotland Act 1998 and the Human Rights Act 1998, society (and particularly the work-place) could be very hostile for LGBTI people (see Macdonald v Lord Advocate; Pearce v Governing Body of Mayfield School [2003] UKHL 34).

Admittedly, the UK was (and still is in spite of Brexit) a signatory to the European Convention on Human Rights.

In particular, Article 8 of the Convention recognises the right to family and private life. It was this Article which was used to overturn extremely restrictive laws on same sex relationships which existed in Scotland, Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands.

Reinforcing Article 8 is Article 14 of the Convention is Article 14 which contains a general prohibition on discrimination.

The late 1960s are often referred to as the key period of the start of gay liberation in the UK with the passing of the Sexual Offences Act 1967 which decriminalised homosexual relationships between consenting adults (aged 21 or over) and as long as such conduct was in private. What is often overlooked is that the 1967 Act applied to England and Wales only. The picture was very different (and would remain so for over a decade – sometimes longer) in various parts of the British Isles.

Homosexual relationships were decriminalised in Scotland in 1980; in Northern Ireland in 1982; the UK Crown Dependency of Guernsey in 1983; the UK Crown Dependency of Jersey in 1990; and the UK Crown Dependency of the Isle of Man in 1994. The age of consent was set at 21 for all these parts of the British Isles; then reduced to 18; and then finally 16 years of age. Societal attitudes had moved on and the law had to follow.

In the last 20 years, the influence of the European Union has also been particularly profound regarding measures to combat sexual orientation discrimination. In spite of Brexit, there is a large body of anti-discrimination law which has been bequeathed to us as a result of our membership of the European Union.

In 1999, as a result of the Treaty of Amsterdam, the EU adopted two Directives which considerably expanded the scope of its anti-discrimination laws (the Racial Equality Directive (2000/43/EC) and the Employment Equality Directive (2000/78/EC). Of particular interest to this discussion is the Employment Equality Directive which made it unlawful to discriminate against a person on grounds of sexual orientation. Admittedly, this Directive was limited because it covered the areas of employment and vocational training only.

This body of law is not just going to disappear overnight when the transitional period for Brexit ends (as currently anticipated by the UK Government) on 31 December 2020. As I often remark, European Union has become hardwired into the various legal systems of this disunited Kingdom.

Indeed, a person’s sexual orientation is, of course, a protected characteristic in terms of Section 12 of the Equality Act 2010. Such individuals should not be subjected to direct discrimination (Section 13); indirect discrimination (Section 19); harassment (Section 26); and victimisation (Section 27).

Even greater strides towards equality were ushered in as a result of the Civil Partnerships Act 2004 which would give legal recognition (and protection) to gay and lesbian people who chose to enter such relationships. These rights would be further underpinned by permitting same sex couples to marry (in England and Wales in 2013 and in Scotland in 2014). Northern Ireland finally legalised same sex marriage in 2020.

When Oscar Wilde was serving part of his sentence in Reading Gaol (which inspired his Ballad of the same name) he could hardly have contemplated life as we know it in 2020.

Related Blog Articles:

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2020/02/02/the-only-gay-in-the-village/

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2020/01/04/pansexual/

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/12/31/civil-partner-i-do/

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/12/08/different-standards/

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/12/06/biased-blood/

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/10/04/a-very-civil-partnership/

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/02/20/love-and-marriage/

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/02/08/the-gay-cake-row/

Copyright Seán J Crossan, 25 May 2020

Assault!

red white and black textile — Photo by Martin Sanchez on Unsplash

The situation caused by the COVID-19 continues to generate all sorts of legal consequences. One of the latest angles to be given wide publicity is the rising number of incidents involving assaults carried out by individuals who claim to be infected with the virus.

Several innocent members of the public – whether they be private individuals, shop workers, Police officers or National Health Service staff – have experienced confrontations with extremely anti-social individuals who have threatened to cough over them or spit on them.

One such incident occurred at the weekend, which was reported by BBC Scotland (see below):

Assault in Scotland is generally treated as a common law offence. It would involve a physical attack (or an attempted attack) on another person. Threats issued by a person to a victim would also constitute an assault if these put the victim into a state of fear and alarm.

In relation to the above incident, the clear intention of the teenager (even if he was completely healthy) was to put the healthcare worker into a state of fear and alarm. Hopefully, the victim will remain completely healthy and free of viral symptoms.

This is not, however, the point: her attacker clearly had the mens rea (the guilty mind) and he followed this through with the actus reus (the wrongful act). If there are witnesses and other evidence which can corroborate the incident, then the Police may have grounds to charge her attacker with assault.

If the criminal investigation proceeds to this stage, it will then be for the Procurator Fiscal (the local prosecutor) to determine whether there is enough evidence to initiate criminal proceedings against the accused.

The Lord Advocate, James Wolfe QC has issued a statement in relation to assaults on key workers:

“The Crown has a range of responses available to tackle unacceptable criminal conduct that may arise during the coronavirus pandemic. Any person who deliberately endangers life, or spreads fear and alarm by pretending to do so, will be dealt with robustly. It is difficult to imagine a more compelling case for prosecution in the public interest.”

Although assault is generally considered to be a common law offence, we should be mindful of the provisions of Section 90 of the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Act 2012 which creates the statutory offence of assaulting or impeding the Police in the discharge of their duties. If an accused is successfully convicted of an offence in terms of Section 90, they may face a maximum prison sentence of 12 months and/or the imposition of a fine.

In England and Wales, a different approach is taken to assault: it is regarded as a statutory offence in terms of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861.

The Crown Prosecution Service for England and Wales has stated that attacks on emergency workers may result in a prison sentence of two years being imposed should the accused (the defendant) be found guilty of such an assault (as per Section 38 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861).

Links to stories on the Sky News website about the rise of this type of criminal offence can be found below:

http://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-nhs-staff-police-and-public-being-coughed-on-by-people-claiming-to-have-covid-19-11965058

http://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-man-who-spat-on-police-while-claiming-he-had-coronovairus-is-jailed-11967349

http://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-police-want-spit-guards-to-protect-officers-from-vile-behaviour-11969529

http://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-policewoman-bitten-on-the-arm-while-explaining-covid-19-lockdown-rules-11971769

In the United States of America, incidents such as the above have more serious consequences: COVID-19 is classified as a ‘biological agent’. Attempts to spread or threats to spread the virus are treated as a terrorist offence (see below):

http://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-two-charged-with-terror-offences-over-threats-to-spread-covid-19-11970802

Copyright Seán J Crossan, 31 March; 6 & 11 April 2020

Mr Salmond tholes his assize

**Screen capture by Seán J Crossan from BBC Scotland’s website**

Strange words i.e. uncommon: thole and assize.

Our non-Scottish readers may have difficulty with ‘thole’ – actually to thole, a verb. It means to be able to endure something or someone. Scots will commonly say that they can’t thole a person , meaning that they dislike or have very little time for an individual. I understand that people in in the North of England also use this word.

Assize is probably a word that some lawyers might be familiar with: it means a trial diet (sitting) of a criminal court. Perhaps the best example of the word coming into popular use was the term ‘the Bloody Assizes’ presided over by the notorious, English hanging judge, Lord Chief Justice George Jeffreys in 1685. These events were, of course, a long time ago and followed the Duke of Monmouth’s ill fated rebellion against his uncle, King James VII of Scotland (James II of England, Ireland and Wales).

Enough of history for now …

In the legal context, if we take the two words together and put them into the following sentence: he has tholed his assize, it means that someone has endured prosecution and trial and has been vindicated or acquitted.

This is precisely what happened today at Edinburgh’s High Court of Justiciary (Scotland’s Supreme criminal court of trial) when the former First Minister of Scotland, Alex Salmond was acquitted of 13 charges that he had sexually assaulted 9 women. The jury found him not guilty of 12 charges and returned a not proven verdict for the remaining charge. Mr Salmond was tried on indictment under solemn procedure in the High Court of Justiciary. Solemn or jury trials are reserved for more serious types of crime and they take place in either the Sheriff Court or the High Court of Justiciary.

It is worth pointing out to our non-Scottish readership that, in Scottish criminal trials, we have 3 possible verdicts, namely:

Not guilty
Not proven
Guilty

Not guilty and not proven are both acquittal verdicts, with the not proven verdict being a peculiarly Scottish development. I noted that the BBC referred to this verdict as “highly controversial”. It’s usefulness is still debated to this day, but it is a common outcome of many trials.

It was the jury of 13 – originally 15 – men and women that acquitted Mr Salmond. The jury in a criminal trial is said to be the ‘Master of the facts’, whereas the judge is said to be ‘Master of law’. It is, therefore, the task of the jury to weigh up the evidence presented at trial and come to its verdict.

At this point, I should also remind our readers that it is not simply a case of prosecution and defence presenting their respective cases at the trial. This would be to ignore the subtleties at play: the prosecutor (in the Salmond case: Mr Alex Prentice QC) has to operate under the onus or burden of having to prove the allegations against the accused. All the defence has to do is to deny the allegations. We operate in a system of criminal justice which emphasises the presumption of innocence.

I have been asked by several people over the last few weeks to predict the outcome of the Salmond trial. I have responded in the following way: I do not know Mr Salmond; and I have never met him or his accusers (I do not know these individuals either), so how can I give you a reasoned opinion?

Ah, but my questioners persist: surely, you have been following accounts of the trial via the media? To which I respond, not really …

Now the media does a very important job, but it can only provide us with a subjective view of things. Journalists will prioritise what they think are significant factors – no matter how impartial they think that they are being. Trial by media is never a good thing; it is to the jury alone that we entrust the task of determining the innocence or guilt of the accused.

We shall never know the precise motivations behind the jury’s decision today. Section 8 of the Contempt of Court Act 1981 makes it a criminal offence for jurors to reveal the reasons for their decisions (an interesting book about a jury trial in England, but not about the jurors’ deliberations, is The Juryman’s Tale by Trevor Grove (Bloomsbury: 2000).

It may be trite to say this, but there are no such things as open and shut cases. Things (the evidence) can and do sound very different in the surroundings of a court room. I have seen overly confident prosecutors come swiftly undone when the defence emphasises a flaw in the prosecution’s arguments. Here comes the nagging doubt I think; the chink in the armour; the reasonable doubt which heralds an acquittal verdict. Nothing is ever certain.

Whatever your views or feelings about Alex Salmond Esquire, this is exactly what happened today: the jury weighed up the prosecution’s case, found it deficient (in that it did not meet the criminal standard of proof) and acquitted the accused.

A link to an article about the Salmond verdict on the BBC website can be found below:

Scotland’s former first minister is found not guilty on 12 charges, while another allegation is found not proven.

Alex Salmond cleared of all sexual assault charges

BBC Scotland has also been running a podcast about the Salmond trial (please see link below)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0864016/episodes/downloads

Related Blog articles:

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2020/02/15/oh-brother/

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/03/01/corroboration/

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2020/01/09/down-with-corroboration-i-say/

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/04/22/scrap-corroboration/

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/05/02/consent/

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/02/25/the-jury/https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/12/28/alexa-theres-been-a-murder/

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/02/10/the-burden-of-proof/

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2020/03/15/kaboom/

Copyright Seán J Crossan, 23 March 2020

Sometimes you have to break the law to change it?

A question I have been pondering quite a lot recently amounts to the following:

‘Is it ever ok or acceptable to break the law in order to change it?’

All sorts of fanatics and the downright criminal will often portray their behaviour as serving a higher purpose when what they mean is that it is entirely self-serving on their part.

The question is extremely contentious (not to say highly subjective), but not as off the wall or leftfield as you might first think.

Why?

Current events that’s why. Pressure groups like Extinction Rebellion, with its programme of environmental activism, are sincerely committed in their beliefs and they have the weight of scientific evidence on their side regarding the threat of climate change. However, it is highly debatable to what extent the public will support their tactics which involve a range of public order offences e.g. blocking major roads and disrupting the transport system. The activists argue that climate change is such an existential threat that any and all means are necessary to give the wider public the necessary wake up call which will swing the pendulum firmly in favour of more sustainable and environmentally friendly approaches to the way in which society is organised.

Taking the law into your own hands?

We have been here before, in fairly recent times, with groups such as the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND); animal rights activists; and campaigners against GM food taking direct (and often unlawful) action against the objects of their ire.

A case I remember very well where this sort of direct action occurred was Lord Advocate’s Reference Number 1 of 2000 [2001] Scot HC 15 (30th March, 2001).

In this case, three anti-nuclear weapons protesters (part of the Ploughshares movement) were accused of illegal entry to a ship (‘Maytime’) which was anchored on Loch Goil in June 1999. The ship had a support role in relation to Royal Navy submarines carrying Trident missiles.

The protesters faced criminal damage and theft charges in relation to equipment which was on the ship. In their defence, the protesters claimed that their actions were justified because they were attempting to draw attention to the British Government’s continued possession of nuclear weapons – a situation which the protesters argued was a crime under international law. Now, there is some merit to this argument as the American led invasion of Iraq in March 2003 was based on the premise that the then Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein was in possession of weapons of mass destruction (which were never found and doubtless never existed).

At the trial at Greenock Sheriff Court, Sheriff, Margaret Gimblet, directed the jury to return a not guilty verdict in relation to several of the charges. As for the remainder of the charges, the jury found the protesters not guilty. The Sheriff Gimblet was extensively criticised for the way in she had directed the jury to return not guilty verdicts. It was felt that this judgement would give the green light to other peace protesters to carry out similar acts as part of their ongoing nuclear disarmament campaign.

The Lord Advocate, therefore, felt it necessary to refer the case to the High Court for clarification where it was held that the protesters were not justified in their actions.

A link to the opinion of the Appeal Court can be found below:

http://tridentploughshares.org/lar-opinion-of-the-court/

The three Loch Goil anti-nuclear protesters had some recent inspiration for their actions from their colleagues. In January 1996, four protestors (part of the Ploughshares group) had broken into a British Aerospace facility and destroyed the controls of a Hawk Jet which was bound for Indonesia. The Indonesians, at this time, ruled East Timor (now an independent state) and were engaged in a bitter armed struggle with East Timor liberation groups.

The protestors claimed that the jet would almost certainly have been used by the Indonesian military as part of their operations in East Timor. By wrecking the jet’s controls with a sledgehammer, the protestors were committing an act of criminal damage (worth an estimated £1.5 million) undoubtedly, but they had done so in order to save lives. They argued that their actions were justified in terms of the UK Genocide Act 1969 (since repealed).

The four women had deliberately filmed the incident and waited at the scene of the crime to be apprehended. You would be forgiven for thinking open and shut case …

… The jury at Liverpool Crown Court acquitted the four protestors of all charges in July 1996 finding that their actions had been reasonable in terms of the Genocide Act.

A video made by the Ploughshares Group about the incident can be found below:

A link to an article The Independent’s website about the conclusion of the protestors’ trial on can be found below:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/pounds-15m-hawk-attack-women-freed-1331285.html

History almost repeating itself

Interestingly, almost 21 years later, Sam Walton, a Quaker pacifist was suspected of attempting to disarm a Typhoon fighter jet at a British Aerospace facility which he believed was for the Saudi Arabian Air Force. Walton’s argument was, again, very similar to previous examples of direct action: he was trying to save lives. He argued that there was a high probability that the jet would be used in Saudi military operations in the vicious conflict in the neighbouring country of Yemen.

A link to an article in The Independent about Sam Walton can be found below:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/british-quaker-activist-sam-walton-pacifist-disarm-saudi-arabia-fighter-jet-bae-uk-yemen-a7555246.html

Historical perspectives

Breaking the law to change it has a long pedigree and the current debate about the tactics of Extinction Rebellion inspired me to review historical situations where people had broken the prevailing law of the land only later to be held up as champions of freedom and progress.

In the last few days, I finally got around to viewing a German film called 13 Minutes (released a few years ago) which was about an attempt on the life of Adolf Hitler on 8 November 1939 in Munich. No spoilers intended (or needed), but the plot failed.

Hitler left the Munich Beer Hall 13 minutes before a bomb, planted in the building by Georg Elser, detonated. People were killed, but not Hitler and the question has persisted as to what would have happened if the assassination had succeeded?

In my humble opinion, I don’t think it would really have mattered as there were plenty of fanatics within the Nazi regime (e.g. Heinrich Himmler and Reinhard Heydrich) who were more than capable of replacing Hitler and furthering his goals.

I did know that the would be assassin, Elser, had been caught in the aftermath of his failed attempt. What I didn’t know was that Elser survived as a special prisoner in Dachau Concentration Camp until April 1945 when he was murdered (he had, in fact, never been tried by the Nazis). Ironically, he outlived one of his interrogators, SS Police General, Artur Nebe, who was executed in March 1945 for involvement in the Plot to assassinate Hitler in July of the previous year.

Clearly, by the prevailing laws of the Third Reich, Elser was a traitor as he had attempted to kill the then German Head of State. History, however, has been much kinder to Elser and he is now viewed as an anti-Nazi resistance fighter of great courage – not an opportunist as Artur Nebe clearly was.

Chartists and Suffragettes

This led me to think about other situations in the past where people fought for their beliefs by breaking the law e.g. the Chartists in the 19th Century who fought for greater democracy in the UK; and the Suffragettes in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries who campaigned for women to be given the right to vote. Nowadays, the Suffragettes particularly are held up as an example of a group of highly principled and determined people who wanted to overcome a glaring injustice.

It’s often forgotten that the Suffragettes moved quickly from peaceful protests to downright terrorist acts e.g. in 1913, the bombing of a house being built for Lloyd George MP, then Chancellor of the Exchequer (or UK Finance Minister). This was followed by bombs being planted at the Bank of England and in St. Paul’s Cathedral.

According to the historian Lucy Worsley, in 1913 alone, there were 168 arson attempts and bomb attacks carried out by Suffragettes across Britain and Ireland. Worsley estimates that the cost of this damage was £56 million in today’s prices. By February 1914, 1,241 prison sentences had been served by Suffragettes and 165 women who had been on hunger strike had been forcibly fed while in prison (Suffragettes first broadcast on the BBC on 4 June 2018).

Did these acts of violence lead to votes for women? This is very contentious and historians, such as Worsley, point more to the transformative impact of World War I as the real catalyst for social (and legal) change. How so? Very simply, the need to recruit women into areas of the economy which previously had been the almost exclusive preserve of men (who, of course, were away at the Front fighting the War).

Conclusion

So, I suppose the answer to my original question is it ever acceptable to break the law to change it depends on which side of history you end up: whether you’re ultimately a winner or a loser.

It also depends on the methods used to achieve legal change. Figures such as Mahatma Gandhi who worked towards the end of British rule in India are held up as exemplars because they used peaceful methods. Other figures such as Eamon de Valera and Michael Collins of the IRA are still, to this day, regarded as extremely controversial in their pursuit of armed struggle against the British Empire in order to obtain independence for what would eventually become the Republic of Ireland.

In 2016, the centenary of the Easter Rising was marked by the Irish Government in Dublin. The Rising is regarded as one of the corner stones of the modern Irish Republic, but how do you mark or ‘celebrate’ what was undoubtedly a violent event? With great sensitivity is the answer and the Irish Government was widely praised for unveiling a memorial which listed everyone (including Irish Republicans and British Army personnel) who lost their lives as a result of the events of Easter Week 1916.

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is 161587273_1462271605.jpg

As for Extinction Rebellion? Well, history will be the judge …

Copyright Seán J Crossan, 11 March 2020

Presumption of innocence?

Photo by Kay on Unsplash

A deeply embedded principle?

Should the accused in a criminal trial enjoy the presumption of innocence?

This is a long established principle of criminal law in the Western World that I have taken for granted since my first days at university. I always remember Professor Kenny Miller (of Strathclyde University’s Law School) correcting students who spoke in error about the ‘guilty’ person in a Scottish criminal trial. They were quickly admonished and reminded of the maxim that everyone is innocent until proven guilty.

Indeed, Article 11 of the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights takes the view that the presumption of innocence is a fundamental human right.

Furthermore, Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights establishes the right to a fair trial and this includes the presumption of innocence. In the United Kingdom, this very important right has been incorporated into Scots, English and Northern Irish law via the Human Rights Act 1998. In Scotland, we, of course, have an additional layer of protection with the Scotland Act 1998.

Article 48 of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights also echoes Article 6 of the European Convention.

Going back to the historical record, the Byzantine or Roman Emperor Justinian I emphasised the presumption of innocence for the accused as part of codification of Roman Law between 529-534 CE. Admittedly, Justinian was building on previous Roman legal practice as the Emperor Antoninus Pius (he of the less well known Wall for our Scottish readers) had introduced the principle during his reign between 138 and 161 CE.

The Romans would say Ei incumbit probatio qui dicit, non qui negat; translated as Proof lies on him who asserts, not on him who denies.

Jewish and Islamic scholars have, historically, also placed huge importance on the presumption of innocence as a cornerstone of their legal practices. Both the Jewish Talmud and Islamic Hadiths (sayings or practices of the Prophet) testify to this.

The Carlos Ghosn Affair

So, why am I reflecting on this area this dull and rainy second day of the New Year?

The escape from Japan of Carlos Ghosn brought the principle forcibly to mind this New Year. Mr Ghosn is the former Chief Executive of Nissan who has been accused of defrauding his former employer.

Mr Ghosn was under effective house arrest in Japan until a few days ago. Allegedly, with the help of his wife, he escaped from that country to the Republic of Lebanon (of which he is a citizen) The escape reads like something from a Hollywood movie script (the Mission: Impossible series anyone?) with Mr Ghosn hiding in a musical instrument case (presumably not a violin case) in order to make good his unauthorised exit from Japan.

A link to an article about Mr Ghosn’s escape in The Independent can be found below:

https://edition.independent.co.uk/editions/uk.co.independent.issue.020120/data/9266461/index.html

A link to a YouTube film about the Affair can be found below:

https://youtu.be/BAxwWW5Ldqo

What is Mr Ghosn’s motivation for leaving Japan in this dramatic way? He claims to have no faith in Japanese justice in that the legal system of that country presumes his guilt.

The Japanese criminal justice system

Not possessing a great deal of knowledge about Japanese criminal practice, I admit that I was somewhat intrigued by Mr Ghosn’s assertions.

I had also just finished reading Owen Matthew’s excellent biography* of Richard Sorge, probably the most successful spy in modern history (and a possible role model for James Bond). Sorge had been spying for the Soviet Union in Japan in the 1930s and 1940s until he was unmasked and arrested in 1941. The treatment of Sorge at the hands of the Japanese criminal justice authorities forms part of the climax to the book.

As Owen Matthews notes:

‘Japanese justice, surprisingly, for an authoritarian state, turned out to be both thorough and scrupulous. The three volumes of investigative documents prepared by the Tokko [the Japanese Police] are exhaustive, far more professional than the cursory evidence which the NKVD [the forerunner of the Soviet KGB] assembled to convict hundreds of thousands of suspected spies in the 1930s.’ [p345]

Does the Japanese criminal code presume the guilt of persons on trial, as opposed to their innocence?

I decided to investigate …

… what I discovered was something rather more subtle.

The Japanese legal system does recognise the right of the accused to be presumed innocent until proven otherwise – despite Mr Ghosn’s claims. The burden of proof rests on the prosecution to demonstrate the guilt of the accused (as in Scotland, England, the United States etc).

There are indeed criticisms of the Japanese legal system that could be made (but no legal system is immune from criticism). In particular, the practice of not allowing suspects to have access to a lawyer during Police interrogation has been highlighted as a weakness of the system.

Before Scots lawyers get too smug, we would do well to remember the Peter Cadder case which led to an overhaul of Scottish criminal practice (see Cadder v HMA [2010] UKSC 43).

Another criticism of the Japanese legal system seems to centre around the practice of prosecutors rearresting an accused when s/he has been acquitted by a lower court. The accused is then taken before a superior criminal court for a further trial and, possibly, conviction.

That said, in Scotland (and in England), we have abolished the double jeopardy rule, but this does not mean that prosecutors have free range to do what they like.

Finally, an accused who maintains his/her innocence under the Japanese legal system, is often not granted bail and can therefore be expected to undergo a lengthy period of detention until the case is brought to trial (Mr Ghosn was perhaps luckier than most being under house arrest). Critics of this aspect of the legal system have pointed out that it puts suspects under duress making them more likely to make an admission of guilt. Mr Ghosn had apparently spent 120 days in detention before bail (with very strict conditions) was granted last year.

Links to articles about the Japanese legal system from the local media can be found below:

https://www.nippon.com/en/japan-topics/c05403/at-the-mercy-of-the-system-criminal-justice-and-capital-punishment-in-japan.html

https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20190109/p2a/00m/0na/015000c

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/community/2003/12/09/issues/burden-of-proof-impossible-to-bear/#.Xg456i-nyhA

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2019/01/05/national/media-national/international-scrutiny-japans-criminal-justice-system-fair/#.XhUY0S-nyhA

Conclusion

The principle of presuming the innocence of the accused in a criminal trial until proven otherwise is a deeply rooted one in the Western World. It is a cornerstone of our justice systems. The United Nations regards it as a fundamental human right in terms of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Yet, to assume that it is a Western concept alone, would be a monstrous conceit. Jewish and Islamic legal scholarship have both emphasised the importance of this principle.

Japan, as a member of the United Nations, also recognises the importance of the principle – which makes some of Mr Ghosn’s claims somewhat misjudged. Yes, the operation of the Japanese criminal justice system can and is the subject of criticism, but this observation also applies to every other legal system in the World.

* “An Impeccable Spy – Richard Sorge – Stalin’s Master Agent” by Owen Matthews (Bloomsbury Publishing: 2019)

A civil action

Photo by Mateus Campos Felipe on Unsplash

What if criminal law lets down victims (and by extension their families)? Over the past year, several of my Blogs have looked at situations where the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service have either not succeeded in prosecuting a suspect in a criminal case or have declined to do so.

In Scotland, the ability to bring a private prosecution is heavily restricted making it almost an impossible task to obtain the necessary authorisation from the High Court of Justiciary (via a Bill of Criminal Letters).

Victims (or their families) will often then have little choice but to turn civil law for some sort of resolution – usually an action for compensation.

I often emphasise to students that criminal and civil law have very different objectives: criminal law is used by the State to punish those individuals who would threaten the safety or security of the community by their actions; civil law, in this context, is primarily concerned with compensating the victims of a wrongful act.

Admittedly, certain types of conduct can be both criminal and civil in nature e.g. assault, dangerous driving, fraud and theft. This means that an individual could face the prospect of two trials. The outcome of each trial is independent of each other.

It is also worth remembering that criminal and civil law have different standards of proof. In a criminal trial, the prosecution must prove beyond reasonable doubt that the accused is guilty of a crime; in civil law, the claimant (or pursuer) must show on the balance of probabilities that the respondent (defender) was responsible for the harm caused. The civil standard of proof is therefore a lower standard of proof.

So, it was of some interest that, in the last week, two stories were widely reported in the media which highlighted the difference between the two systems.

In the first story, it was established that John Downey, a former member of the Irish Republican Army, bore responsibility for the deaths of four members of the Household Cavalry (two British Army regiments) in July 1982. An IRA active service unit had planted a car bomb in London which had caused these fatalities. Downey was a member of that unit, but he had immunity from criminal prosecution under the terms of the Belfast (or Good Friday) Agreement 1998. The families of the victims had no alternative but to raise a civil legal action in the English High Court in order to establish that Downey was an active participant in the planning and execution of the bombing. The success of this action means that the families can now pursue Downey for damages (see Sarah Jane Young v John Anthony Downey [2019] EWHC 3508 (QB)).

It is important to stress that this judgement establishes Downey’s civil liability for the deaths of the four serving members of the British armed forces; it does not establish criminal liability.

A link to the judgement of the English High Court can be found below:

https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/APPROVED-JUDGMENT-Young-v-Downey-18.12.19.pdf

The second story is from further afield and involves a female, Japanese journalist (Shiori Ito) who successfully sued a male TV journalist (Noriyuki Yamaguchi) who had raped her. This case broke many taboos in Japan because victims of rape tend not to publicise their ordeal. Again, the decision of Tokyo’s District Court establishes Yamaguchi’s civil liability for rape – not criminal liability.

In Scotland, of course, we have had two recent civil actions whereby victims of rape have successfully pursued their attackers for the right to receive compensation. It might not be the ideal solution, but in the absence of any action on the part of the State prosecution authorities, it may be the only recourse to justice that the victims have.

Links to media articles about the two cases can be found below:

https://news.sky.com/story/hyde-park-bombing-ira-member-john-downey-was-responsible-for-1982-attack-11889683

Journalist wins Japan civil rape case

Related Blog Articles:

The public interest?

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/11/12/the-public-interest/

The burden of proof

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/02/10/the-burden-of-proof/

Private prosecutions

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/05/29/private-prosecutions/

Serious drugs

Photo by George Pagan III on Unsplash

Petitions for judicial review in respect of alleged breaches of Article 8 of the European Convention (right to respect for private and family life) submitted by serving prisoners seem to be very much in vogue.

At the beginning of December, we had the Court of Session dismissing a petition for judicial review submitted by William Beggs (the notorious ‘Limbs in the Loch’ killer (see William Frederick Ian Beggs v The Scottish Ministers [2019] CSOH 95).

Some weeks later, another petition has been disposed of by the Court of Session which raised many of the same legal principles. David Gilday, another inmate of Her Majesty’s penal establishments, has proved to be no luckier than Beggs.

Gilday was complaining about a breach of his Article 8 rights when correspondence (a greetings card) addressed to him was seized by the prison authorities on suspicion that it was impregnated with unlawful (psychoactive) drugs. Suspicions had been raised when a sniffer dog gave the package more than usual attention.

Article 8 of the European Convention is not an absolute right and it may be limited by State authorities (in this case the Scottish Prison Service) for:

“… the prevention of disorder or crime and for the protection of health or morals.”

Lord Pentland in the Outer House of the Court of Session noted:

“… that prison officers sometimes come into inadvertent contact with psychoactive substances in prison and the view had been taken that the SPS has a duty not knowingly to expose its officers to the risk of being exposed to such substances. That stance seems to me to be responsible and proportionate. In my opinion, a wide margin of discretion should be extended to the SPS to identify what constitutes a risk in a prison setting and to determine how best to address that risk … As I have already explained, the petitioner will become entitled to receive the card in the sealed bag at the stage when he eventually comes to be liberated from custody. I am satisfied that retention of the card until then serves the legitimate aim of controlling the use and distribution of drugs in prison.”

Consequently, the petition submitted by Gilday should be dismissed as the prison authorities had acted quite legitimately in interfering with the prisoner’s rights under Article 8 of the European Convention.

A link to Lord Pentland’s Opinion (Petition of David Gilday for Judicial Review of the actions of the Scottish Ministers [2019] CSOH 103) can be found below:

https://www.scotcourts.gov.uk/docs/default-source/cos-general-docs/pdf-docs-for-opinions/2019csoh103.pdf?sfvrsn=0

Related Blog Article:

For your eyes only?

https://seancrossansscotslaw.com/2019/12/04/red-letter-day/

From 8 to 12

Photo by Michael Skok on Unsplash

Blink and you might have missed it.

Missed what?

From today (29 November 2019), the age of criminal responsibility in Scotland rises from 8 to 12. This Act of the Scottish Parliament was only passed in May.

Before introducing the original Bill, the Scottish Government had previously carried out a public consultation about raising the age of criminal responsibility. This exercise opened on 18 March 2016 and closed on 17 June 2016.

The Scottish Government heralded the results of the consultation exercise as demonstrating overwhelming support for its proposal (95% of respondents agreed), but only 74 responses were received in total.

True, important organisations which are involved in the criminal justice system (such as Police Scotland, the Faculty of Advocates and the Law Society of Scotland) did respond, but many local authorities did not.

Links to a press release from the Scottish Government about the consultation and the report which resulted from it can be found below:

https://consult.gov.scot/youth-justice/minimum-age-of-criminal-responsibility/

https://www2.gov.scot/Resource/0051/00510795.pdf

Historically, Scotland had one of the lowest ages of criminal responsibility in the Western World. The Act now means that Scotland falls more into line with other countries.

Not everyone thinks the Act goes far enough: Bruce Adamson, the Scottish Children’s Commissioner had argued that the reform should go further and that the age of responsibility for criminal behaviour should be raised to 14. Mr Adamson argued that this would bring Scotland into line with the international standard.

https://www.scottishlegal.com/article/children-s-commissioner-argues-12-is-not-an-acceptable-age-of-criminal-responsibility

Interestingly, this reform means that England and Wales and Northern Ireland now have a lower criminal age of responsibility (10) than Scotland.

Examining the bigger picture, the number of children aged 8-11 who have been referred to the Children’s Reporter for committing an offence in Scotland has fallen dramatically from a high of about 800 (2010/11) to about 200 (2016/2017) as the Scottish Government’s own figures demonstrate (see below).

A link to the new Act of Parliament can be found below:

https://www.legislation.gov.uk/asp/2019/7/contents

It is also worth emphasising that the scope of the new Act goes further than merely raising the age of criminal responsibility – as the preamble to the original Bill makes clear:

“[A] Bill for an Act of the Scottish Parliament to raise the age of criminal responsibility to 12 years and to make consequential changes to the law on the disclosure of criminal records and on disclosure of information about individuals working or seeking to work with children or certain adults; on the provision of information by the Principal Reporter to persons adversely affected by the behaviour of children; on the taking of certain children to a place of safety by the police; on the search of certain children by the police; on police interviews with certain children; and on the taking of forensic samples from certain children by the police; and for connected purposes.”

Homicide?

Photo by Valentin Salja on Unsplash

For my latest Blog, I’m sticking with Scotland’s public prosecution system.

The Lord Advocate, James Wolffe QC, has just won an interesting ruling before the Appeal Judges of the High Court of Justiciary.

The case in question is Crown Appeal under Section 74 by Her Majesty’s Advocate v Jason Gilmour [2019] HCJAC 74 HCA/2018/000542/XC.

The reason for the Crown’s appeal was that Mr Gilmour’s victim had subsequently died.

The simple question was this: could the Crown, having accepted Mr Gilmour’s guilty plea to the charge of aggravated assault, then pursue a subsequent prosecution against him for murder?

As Lady Dorrian, the Lord Justice Clerk (Scotland’s second most senior judge) noted:

“The charge of murder alleges that on 11 June 2012 the respondent [Gilmour] assaulted the deceased by repeatedly punching him on the head causing him to fall to the ground, and then kicking, stamping and jumping on his head, whereby he was so severely injured that he died almost five years later on 17 April 2017.”

Before the introduction of the Double Jeopardy (Scotland) Act 2011, it was a clearly established principle of Scottish criminal law that an accused who had assaulted a victim could be charged subsequently with either culpable homicide or homicide if the victim later died due to the injuries sustained by reason of the assault.

The introduction of the Act meant that some clarification of the law was required.

As Lady Dorrian, the Lord Justice Clerk stated in response to the Lord Advocate’s appeal:

“The rationale for this was that the crime of murder was a separate crime and “it cannot be said that one is tried for the same crime when he is tried for assault during the life, and tried for murder after the death, of the injured party”- HM Advocate v Stewart (1866) 5 Irv. 301. In Tees v HMA 1994 JC 12 the accused had pled guilty to a charge of assault under deletion of attempted murder, and was re-indicted for culpable homicide when the victim died.“

In delivering the Opinion of the Court, Lady Dorrian succinctly concluded that:

“Whatever may have been the position prior to the introduction of the 2011 Act … that Act makes it abundantly clear that it should now be possible to prosecute for murder even where there has been a prior prosecution for attempted murder. It is against that background that the Lord Advocate’s acceptance of the plea must be analysed. For this reason also we consider that the acceptance of the plea cannot be construed as the renunciation of a right to prosecute should the victim die.“

Section 11 was the key part of the 2011 Act and the intention of the legislation was clearly to permit the possibility of a subsequent prosecution of the accused for murder – even in situations where s/he had previously faced a charge of attempted murder and had been acquitted.

In early 2019, Mr Gilmour’s had been prosecuted for his victim’s murder. He was convicted of culpable homicide and sentenced to a prison sentence of four and a half years. This has now been upheld by the Appeal Court.

A link to the judgement can be found below:

https://www.scotcourts.gov.uk/docs/default-source/cos-general-docs/pdf-docs-for-opinions/2019hcjac74.pdf?sfvrsn=0