The Court of Appeal has dismissed an appeal against conviction by an appellant identified in its judgment as CJCS, finding that neither of his two grounds met the threshold for consideration under the rule in The People (DPP) v Cronin.
The appeal concerned a jury trial conviction on eight sexual-offence charges. The court said the offending was alleged to have occurred between 4 September 2019 and 4 March 2020, when the appellant was 17 and the complainant was aged four to five. The judgment records that the appellant was sentenced to five years and nine months’ imprisonment, with the final nine months suspended. The appeal was against conviction.
The complainant’s four recorded interviews had been admitted as evidence-in-chief under section 16 of the Criminal Evidence Act 1992 by agreement between the parties. The jury also received the recordings during deliberations, as the parties had requested. To provide balance, the trial judge supplied an agreed transcript of relevant parts of the complainant’s cross-examination.
The appellant argued that the child’s limited recollection made effective cross-examination impossible and rendered the trial unfair. The Court of Appeal observed that the questioning had established that the child remembered being alone with the appellant, sitting on his lap while watching television, and feeling unsafe when alone with him. But she was not directly asked about the alleged sexual acts. The court said further questioning about those allegations appeared possible and that the limited cross-examination did not establish unfairness.
The court also considered the complaint that the jury had access to the recordings during deliberations. It said best practice, under an earlier decision, was for a requested replay to take place in open court before the judge and parties. However, the recordings had been made exhibits and their provision to the jury had been specifically requested by both sides. The court found no error sufficient to establish an apprehension of real injustice on that ground.
Because neither ground had been raised before the trial judge, the appellant also had to explain the omission and demonstrate an apprehension of real injustice before the appeal court would consider them. The court concluded that this threshold was not met and dismissed the appeal against conviction. The judgment did not alter the sentence.