CriminalCustody time limit - fresh offence attracting fresh time limit - provision not inconsistent with guaranteed rightR (Wardle) v Leeds Crown Court: HL (Lord Slynn of Hadley, Lord Nicholls of Birkenhead, Lord Hope of Craighead, Lord Clyde and Lord Scott of Foscote): 8 March 2001The applicant , charged with murder, was held pending committal proceedings in the custody of the magistrates' court under regulation 4 of the Prosecution of Offences (Custody Time Limits) Regulations 1987.

On expiry of the time limit the prosecution preferred a new charge of manslaughter for which the magistrate imposed a new custody time limit.The Crown Court judge dismissed the applicant's appeal.

The Divisional Court refused judicial review of the judge's decision.

The applicant appealed.Alistair MacDonald QC and Nicholas Johnson (instructed by Grahame Stowe Bateson) for the applicant.

David Perry and Sarah Whitehouse (instruction by the Crown Prosecution Service) for the prosecution.Held, dismissing the appeal, (Lord Nicholls of Birkenhead and Lord Scott of Foscote dissenting), that the offence to which regulation 4 referred was that preferred in the information on which an accused first appeared before the examining justices; that since that information determined the scope of their factual inquiry, their sole function being to consider the sufficiency of the evidence for purposes of committal for trial on indictment, any alternative offence of which an accused might subsequently be convicted under the Criminal Law Act 1967 was not included and each new offence attracted its own time limit; that since detention in the magistrates' court was controlled by statute, was subject to judicial control and was accessible and precise, the procedure as prescribed by law, was lawful under domestic law and complied with the requirements of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights; and that it was, accordingly, not inconsistent with article 5.