Friday, August 16, 2013

WIGS IN A TWIST : Quashed convictions row as court staff forced to apologise to judges over claims of ‘wrong data’ released to media

Judges ScotlandBungled FOI release questions quashed convictions figures for Scottish judges. A ROW has broken out between the Judiciary of Scotland and the Scottish Court Service (SCS) over the release of information in response to a Freedom of Information request which sought data on appeals against conviction and sentence at High Court and Sheriff Court level.

The data, which revealed numbers of quashed convictions against senior judges and a former Lord Advocate who also sat as a judge, has already forced apologies from the Chief Executive of the SCS to members of the judiciary and a partial retraction of the information provided via FOI legislation. However the SCS has since been ordered to review what information it did release, and publish a ‘correct’ version as soon as possible.

The now much debated information provided by staff from the SCS claimed that in the past five years, former Lord Advocate & Court of Session Senator Lord Hardie, now retired and sitting as a peer in the House of Lords, allegedly had eight convictions and 20 sentences successfully appealed.

More worryingly, the current number two in the Scottish Justice system, the Lord Justice Clerk Lord Carloway who supports the removal of a long held safeguard of corroboration from the Scottish criminal justice system, was revealed in the now allegedly defective information provided by the SCS as having seven convictions overturned against his judgements since 2008 and eight sentences successfully challenged.

Another well known judge, Lord Brailsford, recently in the news relating to twitter threats made by a family member, was revealed in the SCS statistics to have had four convictions quashed and 15 sentences challenged in the last five years.

Overall, the figures provided by the SCS showed that between 2008 and 2012, there were 301 successful appeals in High Court cases, including 86 overturned convictions.

The figures for legal challenges in Scotland’s Sheriff Courts revealed there were 1,619 appeals granted with 130 convictions quashed, with Sheriff Lindsay Foulis, who sits at Perth Sheriff Court, having two convictions and 39 sentences successfully challenged while in another example, the now retired Sheriff John Herald, who presided at Rothesay Sheriff Court had four convictions overturned and 20 sentences appealed successfully.

However, already up to their necks in controversy over secret financial dealings and undeclared interests in court case after court case, members of Scotland’s judiciary apparently blew several fuses over headlines in the media relating to the numbers of quashed convictions, demanding apologies & retractions over the information released by the Scottish Court Service.

The apology was swift, but for the most part it’s detail appears to rely on the fact that some of the information provided by the SCS exceeded the “five year” term of the FOI request itself … which does not exactly lead to a convincing retraction of claims already published widely in the media.

And in a somewhat humiliating move, the Chief Executive of the SCS was forced to personally write in one newspaper earlier this week in an effort to have his two week old apologetic statement published (reprinted below) … perhaps the delay was caused by everyone wondering what the judges are really up to for their £200K plus a year, expenses and a blank slate for interests on the side ...

The Judiciary of Scotland were asked for comment, although none has been provided at time of publication.

There is a solution of course – publish the statistical records of judges, their judgements, legal challenges and successful appeals on a live basis and the Scots public will be able to see for themselves exactly how our wealthy, well paid, & secretive judges are actually performing in our clogged up “Victorian” Scottish courts system.

The apology : Information on Appeals - Statement by Chief Executive, Eric McQueen

On 18 June Scottish Court Service (SCS), in response to a request for information made in terms of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act provided data on appeals against conviction and sentence at High Court and Sheriff Court level. The data provided was by appeal type and by judge in respect of cases ‘overturned on appeal in each of the last five years’.

Since the data was originally released a number of serious discrepancies have been identified. Additionally, the SCS did not provide important contextual information as to the date of the original court decision in many cases the court decision which was subject to appeal was made more than five years ago.

SCS apologises to those affected. Specifically, SCS apologises to those members of the judiciary whose position has been misrepresented as a result of the data provided. The data attributed to the Lord Justice Clerk includes cases originally decided more than five years ago and includes cases in error.  In the course of his judicial career, which commenced in 2000, Lord Carloway has had three cases in which the conviction was overturned and all of these predate 2008.

Likewise the data attributed to Lord Hardie contains errors in that the data indicated that he had eight conviction appeals listed as being sustained when the correct figure is five.

It is also considered likely that the data in relation to Lord Brailsford and Lord Woolman may contain similar inaccuracies and this is currently being checked.

The position in relation to sheriffs is being considered separately.

SCS is now reviewing all the data and will publish a correct version as soon as possible.

34 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hmm sounds like they are getting themselves in an awful mess over these foi requests..

Perhaps the Lord President and co will order some sackings!

Anonymous said...

I think you suggestion of a 'live' listing of successful appeals and sentence reductions is an excellent one - perhaps collated into a list every three or four months and released to the public.

As you write the SCS 'apology' is based on a technicality, and however one views the figures they are worrying high in a number of instances.

Indeed one might say those concerned should be removed to areas of practice where they can do the least harm.

Anonymous said...

"In the course of his judicial career, which commenced in 2000, Lord Carloway has had three cases in which the conviction was overturned and all of these predate 2008."

Was corroboration a factor in any of these 3 cases and what happened to the other 4 they now claim were wrongly attributed to Carloway?

"Likewise the data attributed to Lord Hardie contains errors in that the data indicated that he had eight conviction appeals listed as being sustained when the correct figure is five."

and the other 3?

"Additionally, the SCS did not provide important contextual information as to the date of the original court decision in many cases the court decision which was subject to appeal was made more than five years ago."

For "contextual" read SPIN.

"Made more than five years ago" means they do not need to include those cases in the figures.

Is this meant to be an apology or what?

If anything it looks just as bad for the judges.

Anonymous said...

Oh well if the judges feel so agrieved at the SCS they can always put in a complaint to the Scottish Information Commissioner and complain about the way the FOI was handled!

Anonymous said...

Whatever the figures really are I'd say there is a big problem with some of your supposedly top judges on top salaries making top errors!

Anonymous said...

Couldnt have happened to a nicer bunch.The SCS have been dodging my fois for months regarding a particular judge and I can tell you this latest scandal on top of the one your petition is generating is just the tip of the iceberg regarding what the judges are doing behind the veil of the court and so called justice.

Anonymous said...

This would be funny if it was in a comedy sketch show but it is potentially criminal because it is real!

How is it possible for Scottish Judges to be 100% wrong on multiple of occasions within a short space of time?

Are they negligent, incompetent or has this got something to do with the evidence of a former Scottish Judges wife, who alluded to a group of Scottish Judges in their gentlemen's club entering into a bet for £1 to see which one of them could preside over the biggest miscarriage of justice; such is the omnipotent and above the law position that Scottish Judges have inveigled for themselves in older that they can wield their vengeful power over the Scottish Public?

This would explain a lot?

Anonymous said...

'Scotland’s judiciary apparently blew several fuses over headlines in the media relating to the numbers of quashed convictions, demanding apologies & retractions over the information released by the Scottish Court Service'

What the effing Hell is going on?

The Scottish Judiciary trying to keep the truth from the Scottish Public about their terrible record?

The rational they would claim is, 'if the Scottish Public were to find out what we get up to and what we are getting away with, they would blow their top and very quickly we would be out of our sweet little number job and can say Ta Ta to our fat salary and fat pension. Better make sure this information is kept secret from them.........and we shall say, 'it is not in the Public Interest - for them to be told', just to show how stupid they are for falling for our sweet arrangement?

Anonymous said...

These numpties should be sacked, have to give back their salaries and properly compensate their victims out of their own money.

Ridiculous state of affairs.

Anonymous said...

This could only happen in Scotland.

Anonymous said...

So, this is the reward the public gets for trusting these fiends to behave properly

Anonymous said...

Why no statement about this scandal from The Lord President, Lord Gill or indeed an apology and an explanation why they tried to snuff-out this information from reaching the Scottish Public?

Anonymous said...

Word in the courts last week was this foi bungle was an attempt at good publicity for the judiciary that backfired when the press decided not to go with the blame it on the SCS staff line,hence McQueen's squirming letter in the Scotsman last week.

I think you will find the figures are much more serious than what we currently know and btw your idea of a live listing of appeals/overturned convictions is excellent.

Anonymous said...

So basically, you trust your case to your lawyer, he trusts your case to Agents in Edinburgh who you may or may not ever meet, these Edinburgh Agents then trust your case to an Advocate (Counsel) who and wait for this.........have your best interests as in position 6 in their hierarchy of responsibilities?

Their First Duty is to the Court?

Their Second Duty is to their member organisation (the Law Society of Scotland or Faculty of Advocates)?

Their Third Duty is to the Edinburgh Agents?

Their Fourth Duty is to your lawyer

Their Fifth Duty is to their opposite number in court (Advocate)

Their Sixth Duty is to YOU and to properly represent your case?


Then, you have the Scottish Judges & Sheriff's, where you cannot be certain of a fair result as supported by these figures?

This is the £Billion pound Scottish Judicial System in reality?

What chance have you got in this Scottish system of getting a fair result?


The sooner they bring in experts (not Scottish lawyers) using polygraph testing the better to get rid of this corrupt old regime and herald a new fairer Scotland?

Anonymous said...

wouldnt surprise me one bit if the foi debacle was faked just to take the heat off the judges regarding their interests being exposed and all these other questions now surfacing about our overpaid wigs..

Anonymous said...

How can these Judges take it for granted that they should have the confidence and trust of the Scottish People when all of this is going on behind our backs?

Smell like a proper Public Inquiry is required. Sooner rather than later and definitely not a Judge led whitewash!

Anonymous said...

Sackings must surely follow?

Anonymous said...

This lot lurch from disaster to laughing stock.

Anonymous said...

Well whatever the figures this deserves an investigation by the Scottish Information Commissioner if Government and Judicial Departments are putting out false figures or fiddled figures as the case may be

Anonymous said...

Great journalism once again. A big thanks to the team at DOI for looking out for the Scottish People.

Anonymous said...

Your idea for publishing statistics on judges and their decisions would be a much needed bonus to the current rambling judicial opinions published by the SCS in bare [and depending on the faces in court] anonymised form.Of course there are exceptions to what I say with regard to the protection of minors however anonymising legal briefs names and companies caught at it is just not on for courts funded by taxpayers.

Keep pushing!

Anonymous said...

My God!

Imagine if they were paid on their performance?

They would be selling the big issue down the supermarket to top up their wages. Either that or flippin' burgers at MacDonalds?

Anonymous said...

One thing is for sure after reading your own take on this, there is much more to this story than the apology which itself is full of holes and seemingly misleading statements.For instance all that stuff about contextual information as has already been pointed out is nothing short of an attempt to hide the real facts and anyway why is all this information not published as a matter of course rather than having to be gained via Freedom of Information?

Anonymous said...

Nepotism

Anonymous said...

A disgrace!

Anonymous said...

Wonder how the figures compare for England & Wales?Anyone asked yet?

Anonymous said...

Interesting that NONO has nothing to say on this matter?

Anonymous said...

This is scandalous, especially when you consider that Scottish Judges will preside over about 12 cases in any year?

Statistically speaking, this hit-rate either points to some of the Scottish Judiciary being unfit to do the job or worse that they may be cooking the books?

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...
Your idea for publishing statistics on judges and their decisions would be a much needed bonus to the current rambling judicial opinions published by the SCS in bare [and depending on the faces in court] anonymised form.Of course there are exceptions to what I say with regard to the protection of minors however anonymising legal briefs names and companies caught at it is just not on for courts funded by taxpayers.

Keep pushing!

21 August 2013 13:06
________________________________

This is a very observant point. Too often do you see the Court Rolls with the names of individuals and or firms abbreviated or with disguised names, so that they can hide the fact that their pals are involved in a Court Case or in fact abbreviated or disguised legal representation?

All of this information should be easily digestible and in a standardised format so that the Scottish Public can see what is going on behind their back?

When I asked the court clerk about one of these cases the other day, I was asked, 'what is it got to do with you?'

Then when I said I wanted to attend as a member of the public I was told I was not allowed to unless I knew somebody involved in the case?

Unbelievable?

So much for having cases under the scrutiny of the Scottish Public?

Maybe as a member of the public I am too dumb to know any different?


How many individuals or firms have bunged the Court Staff a bag of cash to make sure that their name is abbreviated or disguised?

Or where the legal representation is disguised in case a member of the public notices that there is a potential conflict of interest going on?


Unless you are transparent then WE DO NOT TRUST A WORD YOU SAY?

Anonymous said...

Statistics and transparency urgently required so that it can be seen if regular court users keep getting the same judge for their cases?

Anonymous said...

Sack them all

Anonymous said...

You guys must have the worst judges on the entire planet!

Anonymous said...

It is crystal clear that we need to get this Register of Interests into law as soon as possible because it seems like Scottish Judges have been left to their own devices for far too long?

Anonymous said...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-23895116

Judges punch up in a Mexico Court!Do you think this could ever happen in Scotland?