Criminal

Later this year anyone who is arrested in Europe will be able to find out about their legal rights – in their own language – online. Amanda Pinto QC discusses what the Council of Bars and Law Societies of Europe project involves 

The European Commission has decided to provide a pan-European project enabling those who come into contact with the criminal justice system in another member state to find out about their rights in their own language. 

Is it possible to challenge extradition requests based on the right to family life following Norris, asks Abigail Bright 

Nobody has yet successfully challenged an extradition request made under a bilateral extradition treaty on the grounds that the extradition would breach the person’s right to respect for private and family life, as guaranteed by art 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, within the territory of the respondent state. In Norris v Government of the United States of America (No 2) [2010] UKSC 9 the Supreme Court – unanimously – rejected Ian Norris’ argument that extradition to the USA would be incompatible with his right to a private and family life in the UK. Nevertheless, Norris provides overdue guidance on when such a challenge may succeed.  

Lesley Bates reports on the Criminal Bar Association’s Spring Conference 

The Bar must fight to prevent further cuts in criminal legal aid fees and aim for rate restoration as soon as possible. Nick Green QC considers how this can be achieved 

Michael Mansfield QC received an award for “outstanding achievement” at this year’s Legal Aid Lawyer of the Year Awards. 

THE Bar Council has voiced its deep concern over the arrest of Professor Peter Erlinder in Kigali, Rwanda. 

Are the criminal courts the best place for intellectual property owners to protect their rights, asks Alex Stein 

In January 2010 Alan Ellis was unanimously acquitted of a charge of conspiracy to defraud based on his activities as creator and supervisor of the peer-to–peer (“P2P”) file sharing website oink.cd. He was the first person to be prosecuted for such activities in the UK. The website which operated between 2004 and 2007 utilised BitTorrent technology allowing members to share files (mainly music but with some books) between themselves. The site was by far the most popular UK based file sharing site. It generated around £150,000 in donations, attracted in the region of 600,000 members and facilitated 21 million downloads. Ellis, who was only 21 when he started the site, ran it from his bedroom in shared student digs. 

William Hotham recently completed an internship in Ghana helping create a training programme to sensitise law enforcers to human trafficking. He assesses the UK’s record in this area.  

According to the International Labour Organisation about 12.3 million people worldwide are in forced labour, bonded labour, forced child labour or sexual servitude at any given time. Anthony Steen MP recently reported that “more people are trafficked in the world every year than were ever in chains in the 350 years of the African slave trade.” 

Major David Hammond and Paul Hoddinott explain the Bar Council’s involvement in ILAC.  

The Bar Council is one of the 44 member organisations that contributes to the running of the International Legal Assistance Consortium (“ILAC”) based in Stockholm, Sweden. Charged with supervising this affiliation, the International Committee recently reviewed the Bar Council’s exposure to and interaction with ILAC. This was to ensure that our relationship remains mutually beneficial and provides key opportunities for interested, qualified and currently available barristers capable of providing pertinent legal assistance to the international community whilst often operating within demanding and unique environments around the globe. 

Defendants are now required to provide written notice of the witnesses they seek to call at trial. Monica Stevenson considers the likely pitfalls 

Over the last decade criminal practitioners have been greeted with a deluge of legislation, the effect of which has been to increase case workloads at the same time as the government has panicked over the cost of paying lawyers to deal with it all.  Continuing the trend is the new requirement that defendants provide written notification of those witnesses they intend to call at trial. This change is ushered in by virtue of s 6(c) of the Criminal Procedure and Investigations Act 1996 (“CPIA”) (as amended by s 34 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 (“CJA 2003”)) which entered the statute books seven years ago but only came into force on 1 May 2010. It is accompanied by regulations, the Notification of Intention to Call Defence Witnesses (Time Limits) Regulations 2010, SI 2010/214 (“the 2010 Regulations”), and a Code of Practice for Conducting Interviews of Witnesses Notified by the Accused (“the Code”).