Crime

Young offenders - indecent assault - only very grave charges to be tried in Crown CourtR v T and another: CA (Kay LJ, Silber J and...Young offenders - indecent assault - only very grave charges to be tried in Crown CourtR v T and another: CA (Kay LJ, Silber J and Judge Mellor QC): 8 December 2000The defendants, aged 15 and 14 respectively, were convicted on an indictment charging the first defendant with common assault on a girl and both with indecent assault on a different girl, and were each made subject to a 12-month supervision order for the indecent assault with the first defendant being made subject to a concurrent 12-month supervision order for the common assault.

Both defendants were required to comply with section 2 of the Sex Offenders Act 1997 until reaching the age of 18.

They appealed against conviction.Paul Keleher (assigned by Registrar of Criminal Appeals)for the defendants.

John McGuinness and Charlotte Newell (instructed by the Crown Prosecution Service, Wood Green) for the Crown.Held, dismissing the appeals against the convictions for indecent assault but allowing the appeal against conviction for common assault, that it was highly undesirable for such a case involving witnesses and defendants of such an age to be tried in the Crown Court unless the offences were very grave; that there should be no transfer to the Crown Court for trial of a child unless the Director of Public Prosecutions concluded that a magistrates' court would be likely to find that the requirements of section 24 of the Magistrates Courts' Act 1980 (as amended by section 91 of the Powers of Criminal Courts (Sentencing) Act 2000) would be met; and that, since an offence of common assault had to be tried summarily unless section 40 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 applied, which it did not, the trial on the common assault count was invalid and the conviction would accordingly be quashed.