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04

May

Similar Facts PDF Print E-mail
Written by Satish Sekar   
Incredible
The Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) had failed to ensure that its review was conducted by a panel of qualified forensic pathologists. Instead it trusted the review of Heath to a former journalist who was one of its Commissioners. David Jessel reviewed fifty-four cases, concluding that just eight should be subjected to further review. Of those only three were later referred back to the Court of Criminal Appeal by the CCRC – the notorious Kenneth Noye, Mushtaq Ahmed and Simon Hall, whose conviction was sent back for appeal for reasons other than Heath's pathology.

Significantly, all three convictions were not overturned, meaning that despite the fall from grace of a forensic pathologist that judges concede is notorious for vigorously advancing opinions that are not supported by evidence and being inflexible about it when confronted with properly reasoned arguments that contradict his opinion, not one conviction was overturned as a result of the CCRC's review.
This is incredible, but it has not led to a further more detailed review of Heath's cases that takes the possibility that similar facts may affect the safety of convictions into account. Despite repeated efforts by us, the CCRC refused to understand, let alone act on the points that we raised in this respect five years ago. We even gave them a detailed summary of the cases and issues where Heath's pathology had been found wanting by a court or inquest tribunal.

Absurd
Its intransigence at that time was reminiscent of Heath. It clearly demonstrated the consequences of the limited nature of Jessel's review and the absurd refusal of the CCRC to consider similar fact evidence from any of the other cases where Heath's pathology had been found wanting by a court. Many of the other cases that we brought to their attention bore no resemblance to the facts of the two cases considered by the tribunal, Kenneth Fraser and Steven Puaca.

Their refusal to consider similar fact evidence many times beggars belief as two of the proven cases, Sheila Bowler and [Victor] Boreman, [Malcolm] Byrne and [Michael] Byrne raised issues that bore no resemblance to the facts of the tribunal cases were CCRC success stories. There were others too.

The possibility that one or more of the cases that were not referred back for appeal had more in common with one of the other proven cases was never considered by the CCRC review, let alone actively investigated by it. In fact, it repeatedly refused to do so, insisting that it did not understand the point being made.

Consequently, the task of investigating these facts adequately was left to defence lawyers or us. The criminal justice system ignored and tolerated Heath's shoddy conduct for many years and even  now, five years after his fall from grace, it refuses to investigate the true extent of the scandal and allows apathy to continue to reign.

 

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