Tristan Kirk
@kirkkorner
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Courts correspondent for the Evening Standard @standardnews Occasional commentator, professional know-it-all Bluesky @kirkkorner https://t.co/nsnnRas8es
London
Joined February 2009
Met Police issued a Covid fine to a sobbing 18yo woman from Lewisham. She appealed, saying she was trapped in a situation & complying with Covid rules would've meant walking 13 miles home alone at night. Police ignored her appeal, prosecuted anyway, and then misled the court.
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The Met Police happens to be, this week, prosecuting an alleged illegal gathering on December 18 last year. Not in Downing Street, but a house in Ilford.
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The Wagatha Christie case files have arrived. Documents, tweets, and texts at the heart of the WAGs libel trial have finally been disclosed. Here we go. .
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A woman prosecuted for breaking lockdown rules told a court she had inadvertently attended an illegal gathering. "It was not intentional. I didn't realise there would be others present". She was convicted and fined £250.#PartyGate
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Tottenham man given £2,200 fine by a court for going out in lockdown 'without a reasonable excuse'. This is the single biggest fine I've come across for simply going outside without a good reason, and the more I've looked at it, the more concerning it has become. .
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The stalker of Harry Styles has been charged with using force to get into the star’s home, breaking a vase, assaulting a woman, & breaching a restraining order. Pablo Tarazaga-Orero is to appear at Westminster magistrates court tomorrow over the alleged incident on Feb 16.
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Tomorrow, a 59-year-old woman from Ilford is being prosecuted for not wearing a seat belt while riding in the back of a car. People get prosecuted for this kind of thing every single day. A 'brief error of judgment', perhaps, but one taken seriously by police forces.
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Harry Styles' stalker appears in court to face charges of assault, using force to enter a property, criminal damage & breaching a restraining order. The court hears Style was at home when the incident happened. The defendant, now Diana Tarazaga-Orero, isn't entering pleas today.
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A woman from County Durham with learning difficulties and depression. Prosecuted & convicted last week in the Single Justice Procedure for not paying her TV Licence. She's a constituent of Conservative Party chairman @RicHolden . This is the letter she sent to the court.
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Tommy Robinson has lost a libel case brought against him by Syrian schoolboy Jamal Hijazi. He must pay £100,000 in damages to the West Yorkshire teenager, who was slurred after he was filmed being the victim of a playground attack.
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Harry Styles locks himself in his bedroom at night and has beefed up home security after being stalked by a homeless man he took pity on, court hears. The star bought sandwiches for Pablo Tarazaga-Orero after seeing him sleeping rough & offered to put him up in a hotel.
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A 66-year-old man from Brockley was accosted by police for meeting friends at his allotment to break up the loneliness. He ended up with a £100 fine.
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A Met Police officer hit out at a woman who organised an illegal party on the day of Prince Phillip's funeral. "Disrespectful" "totally unacceptable". She was fined £12,000 for throwing the birthday party in Hackney.
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A teenage key worker has been ordered to pay almost £500 by a court after he admitted breaking lockdown rules last January. The Bexley resident, 19, was in a car with three friends and admitted he was relaxing from the "stress and misery" of shifts at Co-Op during the pandemic.
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Police appear to be no closer to investigating goings-on last Christmas in Downing St or Tory HQ. Let me tell you about a young Kingston man & his year fighting a massive fine for a party on Dec 13 last year. This should make MPs stop and think about the system they've created.
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Anyone arguing that the Met Police has better things to do than investigate gatherings more than a year ago may be surprised to know that dozens of Londoners are being prosecuted today for incidents in Dec 2020/Jan 2021.
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Disabled widower from Caerphilly, 78, prosecuted for not insuring a car he no longer uses. He's not coping after his wife's death and his papers were destroyed in a flood. Convicted via Single Justice Procedure, court bill: £106. DVLA didn't read this letter.
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A diabetic man is prosecuted for urinating at Victoria Coach Station. He needed to go, didn't have a key for the disabled toilet, and a member of staff refused to let him in to use the facilities. He's got a criminal conviction for this now.
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Football fan Andrew Banks jailed for 14 days for urinating by the memorial to murdered PC Keith Palmer. Banks said he didn't know what the memorial was for, he had drunk 16 pints on an all-night bender before protests & had attended to "defend statues" but wasn't sure which ones.
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The owner of an Old Kent Road restaurant was prosecuted & fined £1760 over a Nov '20 'leaving do'. "The only reason I did it was for a member of staff", he told the police. The owner appears to have been in his office while others partied, but he was held responsible . #Partygate
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A good number of people are saying that Covid offences are old hat and police have got better things to do. So a timely reminder that six people were prosecuted last week in Hampshire, the Home Secretary's backyard, for breaking Covid rules. £1,100 fines each.
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Mother from Torquay is convicted over unpaid car insurance. The incident was 19 days after her baby daughter died at 3-months-old. The DVLA prosecution continued AFTER this letter was sent. Government says 'fairness is non-negotiable' in the Single Justice Procedure.Is this fair?
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Torquay man, 62, prosecuted for not paying his TV licence. - He has cancer.- He's a full-time carer for his wife & children.- He's on benefits .- He couldn't pay his bills as they were higher than normal. Decision to prosecute was 17 days after he was first caught.
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The Met Police has fined and prosecuted thousands of Londoners over scenes like this. Police officer walks in, sees booze on the table, drinks in hand…instant decision: everyone in the room gets a fine. It’s hard to explain some at this party getting a fine, and the PM not.
EXCL: @ITVNews has obtained pictures of Boris Johnson drinking at a No10 party during lockdown in November 2020. The photos cast fresh doubt on the PM's repeated claims he was unaware of rule-breaking in No10 during the pandemic. See all images here:.
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TV presenter Caroline Flack is accused of beating her partner over the head with a lamp as he slept, over fears that he was cheating on her. Lewis Burton was left "covered in blood", it is said, and police officers likened it to a scene from a horror movie when they arrived.
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Today in court, Julian Assange struggled to say his own name and date of birth as he appeared in the dock. He claimed to have not understood what happened in the case management hearing, and was holding back tears as he said: "I can't think properly".
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This is yet another Single Justice Procedure prosecution, conducted behind closed doors & away from open court. The police decision to fine in the first place is questionable. If a police review of the evidence actually happened prior to prosecution, it wasn't very good.
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Fortnum and Mason has stopped calling police to catch shoplifters. Instead, it hires private detectives to investigate, then brings private prosecutions. They've lost faith in police to do police work.
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Wayne Couzens loses his appeal against his whole life term for the murder of Sarah Everard. Court of Appeal judges find he should have no prospect of ever being free again.
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A 90-year-old housebound pensioner is convicted of not keeping up with his car insurance. He doesn't have email, struggles to walk, can't write anymore & cares for a wife with dementia. In our flawed, secretive, fast-track justice system, this kind of prosecution keeps happening
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Pablo Tarazaga-Orero found GUILTY of stalking #OneDirection star Harry Styles. After Styles had taken pity on Tarazaga-Orero, he slept outside the star’s home, posted notes and cash through his letterbox, and left Styles fearful in his own home and wary about speaking to fans.
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Styles says he now looks for "weak spots" in his home, and claims Tarazaga-Orero tried to grab hold of him during a jog. But when asked if he regrets taking pity on the homeless man, he said he would do it again and has helped numerous homeless people in the past.
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Bristol woman, 57, prosecuted for not paying for a TV Licence. "I have no family or friends. my only lifeline is a TV". Disabled, & depressed after her daughter's death.Struggles with opening letters. TV Licensing won't have read this as she was convicted #SingleJusticeProcedure
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It's a familiar story of a Covid defendant trying to challenge a fine with the police, getting nowhere, & their evidence getting ignored/lost when the case goes to court. In this case, thanks to the defendant's letter, a magistrate adjourned the case to find out more information.
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However, the woman wrote into the court to set the record straight. - she HAD written to the police to contest the fine more than a year ago.- she had 'reasonable concerns for my safety as a young woman'.- no one had ever written back.- police evidence to the court was inaccurate
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Woman, 55, from High Wycombe prosecuted for not paying her TV Licence. - In debt.- Using food banks.- Can't afford heating.- On benefits.- Mental health issues. Says she tried to set up a payment plan but was told "you can't, it's too late". Convicted and ordered to pay £116.
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She holds her hands up to making a mistake by going out that night. She got a £100 fine & paid it. But police came back 2 hours later & issued a second round of fines to the same people. She was apparently in a predicament at that stage, but this appears to have been overlooked.
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This is why court reporters guard open justice so jealously:. An MP wanted a trial without public scrutiny, and he tried every tactic to get it.
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This is the consequence of MPs deciding to criminalise Covid-19 breaches, with no appeals process for the massive fines. While some apparent rule-breakers do not, currently, even face police investigation, others are dragged through the justice system. One rule for them. .
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Huge victory for Prince Harry in his High Court battle with The Sun. An apology for intrusion into his private life across 5 years, and some justice for the treatment of his mother, Princess Diana.
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A man from Birmingham loses his wife to cancer, then gets cancer himself. Convicted in the fast-track Single Justice Procedure for letting his car insurance lapse & not declaring the vehicle 'off road'. Criminal convictions like this illustrate clearly why reform is long overdue
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The alleged offence happened in January last year, during the third national lockdown. This is the police summary put before the court, along with a claim she had "not paid or contested" the £400 fine.
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Almost 2,500 people were convicted last month in private court hearings for not paying for a TV Licence. One was a partially-sighted man from Oldham with learning disabilities. His mum pleaded guilty on his behalf. You wonder what help he got to try to avoid a criminal conviction
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Some reasons for breaking the Covid rules are sad. This Ilford man was threatened with a £10k fine - more than his annual wage - for an event marking a friend's death. It was cut to £1,200 at court. Police focused on presence of a hog roast to say the gathering was pre-planned
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This man organised an online fundraiser to help pay his rent, as he struggled with mental health difficulties and economic woes in lockdown. He protested that it hadn't been a 'party' but still ended up being prosecuted.
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And finally, a young man was prosecuted for throwing a drum&bass house party. He insisted it was mistaken identity, and the case was dropped when he protested: "I really hate drum and bass".
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Yesterday, a man who threatened to kill a woman, punched and slashed her with a knife repeatedly got a suspended prison sentence . Judge cited prisons being full & 3 years of court delays as part of reason for not sending to jail. The last government's legacy in criminal justice.
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Due to the way this fast-track court system works, TV Licensing wouldn't have seen that letter. It wouldn't have had the chance to assess the public interest in pursuing a criminal case against her. And it persists with this flawed system, knowing the results it keeps producing.
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As it happens, there are 14 prosecutions in London for alleged breaches in Dec last year. Perhaps government ministers could say what the point of these prosecutions is, given there's no deterrent effect on the public and they are a drain on police and court resources.
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Covid prosecutions latest: . A 33-year-old man from Cardiff who says he was homeless is due to stand trial over an allegation that he broke lockdown by being 'outside of place where living', in February 2021.
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A neighbour of Harry Styles says Tarazaga-Orero told him the "secret" of his presence in the area: "He says he is a soulmate of my neighbour, Harry Styles, and he is in love.". Tarazaga-Orero denies making the comment & his barrister suggested a language confusion may be to blame.
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A man with cancer is prosecuted over an unpaid TV Licence. He says payment didn't go through when he was in hospital having cancer surgery. He's now convicted & must pay £120 cost of his own prosecution.#SingleJusticeProcedure remains deeply flawed. A constituent of @switherdenMP
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The Justice Secretary is under fire from parts of the legal profession today, after sending a video message to @thebarcouncil #BarConf instead of attending in person. He has apparently not met with leaders of the Bar since taking up the role. Here's what he did instead:.
Great to open the Christmas festival in Walton today - wonderful to see the community out enjoying the festive fun, including the roller-skating Christmas pudding!
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Woman suffers domestic violence, breaks free. She's then prosecuted over an unpaid TV Licence, while still in fear. Tries to fix it but is told 'too late - enter a plea at court'. TV Licensing likely didn't read the plea. Fix the #SingleJusticeProcedure.
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A 70-year-old Londoner prosecuted by the DVLA for unpaid car tax as he received mental health treatment in hospital. He owed £8.75. Now he has a criminal conviction & an £85 court costs bill to settle. A stark illustration of why Single Justice Procedure reform is needed now
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The Downing Street 'party' debacle has shone a welcome light on what's been happening in Covid-19 prosecutions in London. That Ilford gathering I posted earlier is one of a series of cases dating back to December 2020 which are before a magistrate this week:
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She had popped round to deliver a birthday card, she said. No intention to attend an illegal gathering. The woman apologised, and her guilty plea was taken into account at sentencing.
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A magistrate was told the defendant didn't pay the initial £200 fixed penalty notice, & opted to super-charge it by more than 1000 per cent. Maybe it was justified, maybe it wasn't. But it's a potentially life-changing sum of money, not 'trivial' or 'fluff' as some would have it.
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Police have swiftly rebuffed anyone who argues that they didn't know how many people were going to be at a gathering in advance.
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His legal team asked for a delay in the extradition hearing, scheduled for February next year, to gather evidence. They argue the case is politically motived, driven by the @realDonaldTrump administration to "signal to journalists the consequences of publishing information".
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Johnny Depp has denied being a "Jekyll and Hyde" character, and insisted Amber Heard is a "sociopath" who pursued him to further her career. He says she researched him in detail, claiming to like his films when she had not seen them, and that he was an "east target".
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Pensioner, 83, in a care home with severe dementia prosecuted by the DVLA. Car insurance lapsed the day after he moved into the home. This letter from his daughter didn't stop the prosecution & he was convicted. One for Deputy Prime Minister @OliverDowden - his MP - to look into?
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Acid attack victim Resham Khan's message to anyone thinking of carrying acid as a weapon - "don't be a bell end, straight up". Says it all really.
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This is an incredible claim. Officers did exactly this for the best part of a year. Alcohol on the table. music. people having a good time, when restrictions were in force. PCs decided on the spot, time and again, to report everyone in the room for a Fixed Penalty Notice.
"I think it's impossible to expect an officer to walk through a room of people and conclude whether regulations were being breached, when it's taken 12 experienced detectives to work that out" says Sir Stephen. But did the rest of us need 12 detectives to tell us the rules?.
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This man appears to have been struggling when he broke quarantine, and was prosecuted despite apparent efforts to stick to the principles of the isolation rules.
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This woman is perhaps like many others - she unknowingly let her licence expire & was unable to deal with the letters that followed. She was offered an out-of-court settlement, but this letter at least hints that she may have needed extra help to comply with that.
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@realDonaldTrump Assange's lawyer Mark Summers QC said the case in Spain of alleged agents of the US government accused of spying on Assange and his lawyers at the Ecuadorian embassy will form part of their case. "It speaks to the nature of trial Mr Assange faces in due course".
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The next time a politician blithely says they are going to ‘cut red tape’, remember Grenfell. Government zeal for deregulation shares the blame for this disaster.
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Paul Crossley jailed for life with a 12yr minimum for trying to kill two people on the Tube. One victim, Sir Robert Malpas, had to be rescued after falling on to the tracks. Another, Tobias French, narrowly avoided falling in front of a train.
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Ignorance of the rules hasn't gone down too well either. A landlord tried to blame government ministers over the scotch egg 'substantial meal' debacle, but eventually admitted he hadn't read the Covid legislation.
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Even after she entered a guilty plea, TV Licensing could've stopped the case as not in the public interest. It could've gone back to the woman to offer extra help. But without seeing this letter, it's hard to see how any of that would happen. She got a criminal conviction instead.
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Being around a year ago isn't the issue - I'd imagine this prosecution was launched last month. However the basis of it is overwhelmingly likely to be a police officer's statement, giving evidence of what they saw on Dec 18.
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Prince Harry's lawyers rebuked by a High Court judge for 'entirely unacceptable' leak - and a reluctance to apologise.
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Here's a 71-year-old woman from Kent. A constituent of former Courts minister @GarethJohnsonMP . She has significant mental health problems, and was prosecuted for not paying her TV Licence. She ended up having to pay £116.
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The Duchess of Sussex is seeking up to £1.5m in costs after her High Ct privacy & copyright victory against the Mail on Sunday. She wants a front-page statement about the case outcome, copies of her private letter destroyed & damages by way of profits from the newspaper articles.
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@RicHolden Hi Richard, I'll do that. Would you have a look at the wider issues this case raises? For each one I highlight, there will be many more that go unseen. There are systemic problems in the SJP system that only MPs can effectively tackle.
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If he had broken the law with driving offences, shouldn't he have been charged with those and dealt with separately? . Maybe he will, at which point there will be a danger of what lawyers call 'double counting'.
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The Downing St 'party' case faces two obstacles: .- police policy not to investigate Covid breaches its officers didn't personally witness.- a lack of actual evidence. Nothing insurmountable, but you'd imagine a whistleblower speaking to police is essential.
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Defendant got a £2,200 fine, £190 victim surcharge & £100 costs at Westminster magistrates court last month. Dealt with 14 months after offence was committed, and in the Single Justice Procedure therefore the decision-making process is opaque. What prompted such a large fine?.
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"I did it because I didn't want to be alone" . I threw a party "to celebrate the easing of lockdown restrictions". Around 2,500 people have now been prosecuted for Covid offences in London, with many more still to come.
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Disabled woman, 62, from near Sunderland, prosecuted over unpaid TV Licence. She's partially blind & has memory problems after a brain hemorrhage. How much help did she really get to avoid a criminal case?. Convicted via Single Justice Procedure & told to pay £56.@SharonHodgsonMP
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If an organisation says it wants to avoid criminal prosecutions where possible, it shouldn't use the Single Justice Procedure. Because SJP effectively excludes prosecutors at sentencing, when key information emerges for the first time. The system is fundamentally flawed.
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'Yellow vest' protestor James Goddard's court hearing has been suspended after his supporters chanted "Soubry is a Nazi" and "Shame on you" from the public gallery. Urging Goddard to sack his lawyer, the hecklers refused to leave and so the judge walked out instead.
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I've just been asked to leave the press bench in a crown court to avoid the jury wondering who I am. When I said I didn't want to, and shouldn't have to, the clerk told me I was "being difficult". It's not a great start to my morning.
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You join me in a busy magistrates court, waiting for a Met Police officer to appear on rape charges. Most people won't set foot in a courtroom like this. It's chaotic at times, the cases are varied, and justice is served. Here's what I'm listening to:.
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This is the police officer's assessment, admonishing the teenager and suggesting he could be a "super-spreader". The defendant said he is "filled with shame" and apologised, but will now have to contend with a criminal conviction that could hang over his future.
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The only logical conclusion is he was fined more harshly than anyone else because police said he was speeding & driving without insurance at the time - an aggravating feature. However, the court had no evidence of those claims. No additional charges, only the police's say-so.
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Lord Zac Goldsmith has been banned from driving for a year after he racked up a whopping 11 speeding offences in the space of 20 months. He got to 12 penalty points last March, but didn't face court or a ban. After that, he offended a further seven times.
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Prince Harry under fire at the High Court after going missing from 1st day of his individual phone hacking claim against Mirror Group Newspapers. Judge said he's 'surprised' - Harry had been told to be ready to start his evidence today. MGN barrister calls it 'extraordinary'.
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@realDonaldTrump District Judge Vanessa Baraitser refused to delay the case and set down orders for service of evidence and arguments. The full hearing is due to be heard from February 24 next year, at Belmarsh magistrates court. The next case management hearing is on December 19.
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I don't think the Covid regs set a maximum for a court to fine an offender - the general principle has been bigger penalties for repeat offenders. This man got a fine equivalent to a 4th or 5th time offender, but the court had no evidence he'd ever previously broke lockdown.
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Jeremy Corbyn's egg attacker John Murphy sentenced to 28 days in prison. Chief Magistrate Emma Arbuthnot said: "An attack like this is an attack on the democratic process". She ruled Corbyn is vulnerable, the attack was premeditated, and the effects have been wide-ranging.
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Did COVID lockdown laws penalise the most vulnerable in our society?. Surely a question the Covid Inquiry will tackle, whenever it happens. For now, a snapshot of prosecutions brought under Covid powers by Wiltshire Police….
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The vast majority of 1st-time lockdown breakers were punished within a range up to £1,100. Many who had parties at their homes were spared £10k fines, charged with a lesser offence of attending the gathering and punished accordingly. £2,200 is a big fine in London's Covid court.
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The rise in the Crown Court backlog, in the 18 months before the pandemic. This was deemed acceptable, courthouses were shutdown, and it has nothing to do with Covid-19.
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A special officer's witness statement is the only evidence in the court file. In it, he refers to himself by the ranks of both Special Constable & Special Sgt. Perhaps he was promoted mid-statement. To add confusion, court papers say the statement is from PC (defendant's surname).
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David Beckham banned for six months from driving for using a mobile phone while behind the wheel. He was also fined £750, and ordered to pay £175 in court costs and fees. His lawyer said Beckham finds driving "relaxing" and he will miss taking his children to and from school.
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"There needed to be consequences for her actions", wrote the PC. She had a DJ set, food, and booze for more than 30 guests. To be fair, she also had a marquee and a bouncy castle, which no one has accused Downing St of yet.
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She is one of at least six people in London being prosecuted for this offence this week. Last week, a 42-year-old man from Dagenham was convicted of the same crime. A £220 fine, plus a £88 victim surcharge and £100 in costs was the penalty.
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