I observed the following incident at a north London magistrates’ court.

A defendant, who was clearly mentally ill, had been charged with an offence that was contrary to section 5 of the Public Order Act. The facts were that he had been shouting at a group of children in the street in an agitated state. He had obviously not been represented in the police station because he would not have been interviewed. Therefore, no one had made any representations to the police as to whether it was in the public interest to charge the defendant.

He was effectively being prosecuted for being mentally ill. He was unrepresented at court because the offence was non-imprisonable. Therefore, he was not entitled to legal aid or the services of the duty solicitor. The bench had clearly noted his mental illness because they had allowed his sister to accompany him into the dock of the court. He entered a not guilty plea. At no point had he had the benefit of face-to-face legal advice. When he was told that the case had to be adjourned for a trial date, he changed his plea to guilty, despite saying that he was not guilty. He then started talking about hearing voices in his head, which were being received from an imaginary sinister organisation.

Despite this, the legal adviser and the bench accepted this as an unequivocal guilty plea. He was sentenced by means of a conditional discharge, but on leaving the dock the members of the bench seemed to be laughing among themselves about what the defendant had said in the court. This suggested a total lack of sympathetic understanding of mental illness on their part.

The Crown prosecution should have been persuaded not to proceed with the charge. A vulnerable person received a criminal conviction, which should not have happened. The whole episode made me feel very uncomfortable and ashamed to be part of a criminal justice system which operates in this way. Legal aid eligibility rules prevented this person from receiving legal advice and representation. The cuts to funding are only going to make scenarios like this one more common.

Graeme Hydari,consultant, Needham Poulier & Partners, London N17; member, Law Society criminal law committee