The defendant had been cross-examined by reference to a diary found in the possession of his girl friend which was inadmissible against him. He was repeatedly asked what the writer meant by her entries. He appealed his conviction.
Held: The use made of the diary was improper. There had been a material irregularity.
Lord Lane CJ said: ‘It seems to us there are two objections which should properly be made to that line of cross-examination. First of all it is quite improper to ask a witness to explain what a third party means by a document written by that third party. No doubt if this witness had been more experienced, he would have said that that was impossible, but then he would have run the risk of being thought to be too clever. As it was, he found himself in the position of trying to explain to the jury what a third party meant by a document written by that third party without his collaboration.
Secondly, perhaps more importantly, it is, in our judgment, quite improper for counsel to take in his hands a statement which is inadmissible vis-a-vis the witness whom he is cross-examining, let alone allowing the jury to have a copy of the statement in their hands whilst he is doing that, and then to ask the witness to explain, almost sentence by sentence, the highly damaging statements, inadmissible against him, which the maker of the document had written.
It is of course perfectly possible and perfectly proper for questions to be put in cross-examination such as ‘were you in such and such a public house on such and such a day? Were you with such and such a person?’ But to link it, as was done here, with the contents of a document inadmissible against the witness being cross-examined was, in our judgment, a matter which should not have occurred.’
Judges:
Lord Lane CJ
Citations:
(1989) 89 Cr App Rep 258
Cited by:
Cited – Vincent and Another v Regina CACD 26-Jan-2007
The defendants appealed their conviction for what was a planned murder of an established criminal. They complained that their trial should have been severed from another defendant who had made statements implicating them, but then failed to give . .
Cited – Regina v Gray, Evans CACD 20-Feb-1998
Any practice of cross examining a defendant on statements which were admissible against co-defendants but not as against him must stop. . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Criminal Evidence, Criminal Practice
Updated: 01 May 2022; Ref: scu.248264