Enhanced criminal record certificates (see 'Tainted records') were brought in after the Ian Huntley murder cases to protect ‘children and vulnerable adults’. Commendable though this may be, what does not seem to have been envisaged by our politicians was that the lives of numerous innocent people would be blighted. Here are a few examples from my current caseload (I could cite dozens more):This information has prevented these clients from getting work. It is information which is disclosed to the Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) by the police on the basis that ‘it might be true’. This hardly equates, I would suggest, with our (ostensibly) world-renowned English legal system’s reputation for justice and equality. How many of us know what is on our enhanced CRB record?

  • A certificate containing a fraud conviction from Germany, an offence which the client could not possibly have committed;
  • Information (in the box entitled ‘other relevant information’) that a client had reported that she had been raped and was then arrested (but not prosecuted) for wasting police time
  • Information that a client had been sacked from his job for an alleged incident over which he had neither been arrested nor questioned by the police;
  • Incorrect information that a client had been cautioned for cultivation of cannabis.

Susan M Gregson-Murray, Gregsons Solicitors, Nottingham