criminal law

Contempt proceedings before justices - legal aid - wrong to refuse on ground that no contempt foundR v Selby Justices, Ex parte Daltry: DC (Rose LJ and Elias J): 30 October 2000While in court observing proceedings involving a friend of his, the claimant made a comment which the clerk to the justices thought could be construed as a contempt of court.

The claimant chose to be represented in the contempt proceedings by his own solicitor who was present in court, and who filed an application for legal aid.

After representations from the claimant's solicitor, the justices found that they did not regard the comment as a contempt, but, on their clerk's advice, refused the application for legal aid on the basis that there had been no contempt.

The claimant sought judicial review of the refusal.Kerry Barker (instructed by Philip & Robert Howard, Castleford) for the claimant.

The justices did not appear and were not represented.Held, granting the application, that the effect of the clerk's approach was that legal aid might only have been available in relation to the matter of sentence, but not in relation to the determination of the prior question of whether the claimant had been guilty of contempt at all; that s.29(2) of the Legal Aid Act 1988 conferred a power on the court to grant legal aid in any proceedings for contempt if it appeared to the court to be 'desirable to do so in the interests of justice'; that since contempt was a potentially serious matter the investigation of which generally required representation the clerk had been wrong to reach the view he had; and that, accordingly, the refusal would be quashed and a direction made that legal aid should be granted.