The Court of Appeal has dismissed L.C.’s appeal against 31 convictions for sexual assault, anal rape and oral rape, ruling that none of the grounds argued on appeal had merit.
The convictions followed a fifth trial, in which a jury found L.C. guilty on all 31 counts on 1 October 2021. The complainant alleged that the offences occurred when he was aged between 13 and 18. The judgment says L.C. was a neighbour, approximately 20 years older, and employed the complainant part-time at a small business beside L.C.’s residence. The alleged assaults were said to have taken place over several years at L.C.’s property and another nearby property owned by his family.
The appeal focused on the trial judge’s directions about evidence that the complainant had told a former partner, sometime between 2000 and 2006, that he had been abused. He had not named an alleged perpetrator. The evidence had been admitted to rebut the defence claim that the later allegations were a recent fabrication prompted by a business dispute.
L.C. argued that the judge’s directions invited the jury to infer that the unnamed abuser was L.C., and that the jury should have been told explicitly that the former partner’s evidence was not corroboration. The Court of Appeal found the judge had not invited that inference. It said the jury had been told that no individual was named, that the prosecution carried the burden of proof, and that the recent-fabrication issue was for the jury to decide. The court also held that the judge’s clear warning that there was no corroboration made a further direction about the former partner’s evidence unnecessary.
The remaining ground argued that subjecting L.C. to five trials on the same charges was oppressive and breached fair-trial rights. The prosecution submitted that only two trials reached jury deliberation: one ended with a disagreement and the fifth resulted in convictions. The other three juries were discharged on the defence’s application. The Court of Appeal accepted that procedural history and found no possible injustice. It said there was no obligation on the trial judge to enquire into the history, and rejected the abuse-of-process ground.
The Court of Appeal, in a judgment delivered by Ms Justice Isobel Kennedy on 19 December 2024, dismissed the appeal. The judgment addresses the grounds raised and does not set aside the convictions.