The case concerned the distinction between the magistrates' power to 'rectify' undoubted mistakes and a defendant's attempts to have his conviction reviewed. And the court deprecated yet again the presentation of extrinsic material on a case stated.

ADDED Thursday 3^rd February 2022

At a trial for controlling or coercive behaviour, should the jury have been given a Brown direction to the effect that they must only convict if they were all agreed on at least one of the instances of such conduct pleaded in the Particulars of Offence?

ADDED Wednesday 5^th January 2022

Is kidnapping a continuing offence or is it complete as soon as the victim has been taken against their will? Should those responsible for the subsequent movement and detention of the victim be charged with false imprisonment or with another kidnapping?

ADDED Tuesday 4^th January 2022

Where police officers had restrained an individual, in order to prevent him from doing himself harm (but with no initial intention to arrest him), were they exercising their ‘functions’ for the purposes of the offence of assaulting an emergency worker?

ADDED Thursday 30^th December 2021

The case was concerned with the question whether a magistrates’ court had power to send a defendant charged with an indictable only offence to the Crown Court for trial where that defendant was absent from the hearing but was represented by counsel.

ADDED Wednesday 29^th December 2021

Can a voluntary act by the victim displace the responsibility of the perpetrator, so that the deceased is treated as having caused his own death? And can a voluntary act on the part of the victim be rendered involuntary by reason of a deceit practised by the perpetrator?

ADDED Tuesday 28^th December 2021

The case was concerned with freedom of expression and freedom of assembly, insofar as those rights impact on the question whether protestors intentionally blocking a highway have a ‘lawful excuse’ for the purposes of s.137 of the Highways Act 1980.

ADDED Thursday 23^rd December 2021

Is a 'Conclusive Grounds Decision' that a person is a victim of modern slavery (being a decision made for administrative purposes, based on written materials and according to the balance of probabilities) admissible in evidence in a criminal trial?

ADDED Wednesday 22^nd December 2021

The case concerned (1) the approach in the Crown Court to the award of costs out of central funds to a private prosecutor, and (2) the jurisdictional position where that court acts without jurisdiction rather than in a mistaken exercise of jurisdiction.

ADDED Friday 17^th December 2021

The case concerned whether the Crown Court had erred in law when discharging a Reporting Restriction Order, which prohibited the reporting of the address of a mother charged with the murder of her new-born baby and disposal of the body in a public park.

ADDED Thursday 16^th December 2021