The decision of legal issues must depend on rigid rules of evidence necessarily general in their scope. It was very likely, therefore, in individual applications, to present an appearance of artificiality and even of inconsistency: ‘The issues pronounced upon by courts in criminal, and indeed, in civil matters are attended with such decisive consequences that the adoption in matters of evidence of a standard of admissibility which is so cautious as to be meticulous may not only be defended, but is in fact essential.’ and ‘Applying these considerations to the kind of difficulty which has often presented itself in the Divorce Court, we find that a case which has sometimes been ignorantly derided is in fact both logical and defensible: for instance A, a husband, brings against his wife, B, a petition for divorce on the ground of her adultery with a named co-respondent, C. There is some independent evidence against both B and C, but not sufficient to justify a positive adverse conclusion. B, however, makes a full confession. Here the court may very reasonably pronounce a decree against B, while concluding that the matter is not established as against C. Indeed, to hold otherwise would be to lay it down that the admission or confession of B – which may be quite untrue and which may be induced by hidden and private motives – is to be treated as good evidence against C. And so it happens that the court may quite reasonably conclude that it is proved that B has committed adultery with C, but not that C has committed adultery with B.’
Viscount Birkenhead
[1923] AC 1
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Regina v Hayter HL 3-Feb-2005
The House considered the principle that the confession of a defendant is inadmissible in a joint criminal case against a co-defendant. In a trial for murder, one party was accused of requesting a middleman to arrange for the murder by a third party. . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 15 October 2021; Ref: scu.222546