Criminal

Bankrupt delivering up documents under compulsion - prosecution seeking to adduce documents in evidence in subsequent criminal proceedings - no violation of convention rights Attorney-General's Reference (No 7 of 2000): CA (Lord Justice Rose, Mr Justice Rougier and Mr Justice McCombe): 29 March 2001A bankrupt was obliged under section 291(1)(b) of the Insolvency Act 1986 to deliver up to the official receiver all records relating to his affairs.

That duty was backed by the contempt sanction in section 291(6), so that he was under a compulsion.He was charged with an offence under section 362(1)(a) of the 1986 Act that in the two years before petition he had materially contributed to or increased the extent of his insolvency by gambling.

On an application to stay the proceedings as an abuse of process, the trial judge ruled that admission of the documents would be a violation of article 6 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights as scheduled to the Human Rights Act 1998, and directed an acquittal.

The Attorney-General referred to the court a question of law, whether the use by the Crown in the prosecution of a bankrupt for an offence under chapter VI of part IX of the 1986 Act of documents which had been delivered up to the official receiver under compulsion and did not contain statements made by him under compulsion violated his right under article 6.James Eadie (instructed by Legal Director, Department of Trade & Industry) for the Attorney-General.

David Perry and Gareth Patterson (instructed by Picton Smeathmans, Hemel Hempstead) for the acquitted person.Held, answering the question in the negative, that a distinction was to be made between a statement and other material independent of the statement; accordingly, in criminal proceedings against a bankrupt, documents which did not contain statements made by him under compulsion, but were delivered to the official receiver under compulsion, did not violate his rights under article 6.

(WLR)