Source: All England Reporter
Publisher Citation: [2005] All ER (D) 81 (Aug)
Neutral Citation: [2005] EWCA Crim 1979
Court: Court of Appeal, Criminal Division
Judge:

Laws LJ, Holland J and Dame Heather Steel
Representation Peter Rook QC and Mark Lucraft (instructed by Kingsley Napley) for the defendant.
  Joanna Glynn QC and Julian Christopher (instructed by the Revenue and Customs Prosecutions Office) for the Crown.
Judgment Dates: 19 August 2005

Catchwords

Criminal law - Trial - Summing up - Conspiracy to cheat the Revenue - Whether judge's summing up adequate - Whether conviction unsafe.

The Case

In the circumstances of the instant case, where the defendant had been involved in a conspiracy to cheat the Revenue, the judge's summing up illustrated the virtues of brevity. Whilst the court could be entitled to hold that a conviction was unsafe where a judge had achieved brevity in his summing up at a price of a failure properly and fairly to deal with the essentials of the case, in all the circumstances of the instant case the conviction was not unsafe. The judge had certainly left out a lot of detail. He had concentrated on the essentials of the case and had done so fairly and clearly. The jury could not have failed to understand the issue of the sham and the defendant's case.

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