The Court of Appeal has dismissed Greta Dudko’s appeal against her murder conviction, finding that the trial was not unfair or unsatisfactory and that the verdict was not unsafe.
Dudko was convicted in the Central Criminal Court on 22 October 2014 after an 11-day trial. She had pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to manslaughter. At trial, it was not disputed that she unlawfully killed her mother, Ana Butautiene. The dispute was whether the appropriate verdict was murder or manslaughter, with the defence relying on provocation and arguing that intent to kill or cause serious injury had not been proved beyond reasonable doubt.
The appeal challenged, among other matters, how the trial judge presented the defence case and evidence about alcohol, medication and intoxication to the jury. The Court of Appeal said the judge’s interventions during the evidence did not render the trial unfair. It also rejected the argument that his decision not to rehearse the medical witnesses’ cross-examination, including questions about alcohol elimination, made his charge unfair.
The court also upheld the admission of photographs showing the deceased at the scene. It found the images relevant to the jury’s consideration of Dudko’s account of the fight and noted that the deceased’s face had been pixelated.
A further ground concerned the judge’s warning to jurors about lies told by an accused person. The appeal argued that the warning should have been linked to the defence of provocation. The Court of Appeal said it would have been preferable for the judge to address the possibility that someone who killed after losing self-control might lie. But it concluded that the omission did not make the jury charge so unsatisfactory that the verdict was unsafe.
The court therefore dismissed the appeal. It did not overturn the conviction.