Page 438 - Magistrates Conference 2019

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inform a police officer. Mr Whittam said that this illustrated that the jury had focussed on the importance of the
consistency of C's various accounts.

(c) Ground 1: Recent Complaint: Analysis and Conclusion

136. In our judgment, the submissions of the respondent on ground 1 are to be preferred. Despite Mr Blaxland's
attempts to distinguish both cases, we consider that the position here was very similar to that in Ashraf and R v H. It
would have been quite clear to the jury that the complaints were made by C herself, so that there was no question of
independent support. Moreover, the judge reinforced this with repeated references to the need for the jury to consider
carefully the consistency between C's various accounts (including the complaints).

137. In addition we consider that the summing-up, when considered as a whole, properly stressed the importance of
whether or not the jury could be sure that C was telling the truth, both in respect of her evidence in court and her earlier
accounts to others. The central issue for the jury was therefore properly and fairly highlighted. Accordingly, we
conclude that there is nothing in ground 1 of this appeal.

Ground 2: Good Character Direction

(a) Appellant's detailed submissions

138. The second ground of appeal concerns the good character direction. Again, Mr Blaxland said that the Crown's
failure to adduce the appellant's previous convictions under s.101 entitled him to a good character direction. The judge
had failed to give such a direction, and instead directed the jury to "bear in mind" the age of the offences, and the fact
that they did not include sexual offences, when considering whether the appellant had committed the offences with
which he was charged and whether his evidence was to be believed. This failure to spell out the positive effect of the
appellant's recent good character and the lack of similar offending, alongside a warning about reliance on the
defendant's criminal record, Mr Blaxland complained, significantly diminished the necessary protection of the good
character direction.

(b) Respondent's detailed submissions

139. Mr Whittam submitted that, although it was correct that there were no convictions for sexual offending, and no
recent convictions, the appellant had a prolific record. The modified good character direction provided by the judge
could not be criticised. His past offending was summarised crisply with the words "we know about the defendant's
criminal past", with proper emphasis on the fact that he had not been convicted of any offences since 1996 and that he
had never been convicted of any sexual offences. There was no misdirection.

(c) Ground 2: Good Character Direction: Analysis and Conclusion

140. As to credibility, our analysis and conclusions are the same as that in the previous appeal of Walker. There was
no automatic entitlement to a positive good character direction, regardless of the position under s.101. This was a
defendant with a considerable number of previous convictions for both dishonesty and violence, and it would have been
an affront to commonsense to say that he was entitled to a positive good character direction on credibility. He plainly
was not.