Florida Criminal Lawyers

A report into standards in the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) says that some cases are being put in jeopardy due to mistakes by prosecutors.

Inspectors assessed a total of 861 cases and found that 7% of cases were either mistakenly discontinued or prosecuted as a result of errors by prosecutors in both analysis and judgement, with this leading to greater anxiety from both victims and witnesses and also cases which saw prosecutions brought against people who had done nothing wrong.

While the number of mistakes has fallen since a new scheme was introduced in 2010 to help drive improvement, Michael Fuller, chief inspector of Her Majesty’s CPS Inspectorate, said that there would only be a sustained improvement in standards if the CPS used a “robust assessment process”.

The thought of people being sent to prison due to the failings of the CPS, or going free for the same reason is incentive enough for every effort to be made to keep prosecutor mistakes to a minimum. Have you any experience of the workings of the CPS, good or bad? We’d like to hear from you if you have.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/cps-prosecution-errors-causing-distress-7592981.html?origin=internalSearch

Are children’s homes “criminalising” youngsters in their care by prosecuting them for minor offences which would be treated differently if the youngster was at home with his or her parents?

A leading magistrate certainly believes so: Janis Cauthery is critical of the care system, saying that it too often resorts to prosecution when there are other alternatives. Mrs Cauthery, who sits in Warwickshire, says that many of the acts, which occur in the care home itself, while classed as criminal damage, are often little more than breaking a window or breaking crockery; acts which are unacceptable but in the ordinary domestic setting would lead to little more than a severe telling off from a parent. She adds that, by treating these matters more seriously than they should, they run the risk of the children themselves being led into a “cycle of crime and homelessness”.

Is Janis Cauthery right in her views? It seems, from her comments, that too many homes view their residents as potential criminals rather than vulnerable children in need of love and support. Though she says that this only affects a minority of children in care, it is still too many and will do little to help them in the perilous adjustment to adulthood.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2128497/Magistrate-attacks-care-saying-criminalises-children-prosecuting-trivial-matters.html

A jury member who phoned in sick while she was on holiday in Malta has been given a 56-day sentence for contempt of court. Was the judge right to punish her in this way?

Janet Chapman was a jury member in a robbery trial that was expected to last four weeks, but on the Monday of the fourth week she phoned the court to say she would not be in because she was suffering from sciatica. However, it emerged that the call had been made from Malta, where Chapman had gone on holiday despite her obligations to the court.

She had visited her doctors complaining about her back and was given a sick note for seven days but flew out to Malta, claiming to be unaware that she was not allowed to go on holiday during jury service. The judge at Preston Crown Court said that she had “deliberately deceived” the court for her own means.

Was the sentence right given the inexcusable behaviour or was it a little harsh given that she was said to be suffering from back pain even if she did undoubtedly lie about her reason for not being at court. Let me know what you think.

http://www.lawgazette.co.uk/news/custodial-sentence-holiday-juror

Personal injury lawyers have given a lukewarm response to the Prime Minister’s latest speech attacking the country’s health and safety culture.

David Cameron spoke to a group of small business leaders last week and said that the current situation made it much too easy for personal injury lawyers to launch action against businesses who often settle the case out of court because it is too expensive to fight it.

The PM told his audience that the government was committed to exempting a million self-employed workers from regulation, to removing the need for employers to report minor accidents and it wanted to place a limit on the amount that solicitors could earn from small-value personal injury claims.

However, David Bott, president of the Association of Personal Injury Lawyers, has said that the government should give more information on the proposed changes and said that businesses should be made to feel confident in the knowledge they have nothing to fear from litigation as long as they take reasonable steps to avoid needless injury.