Category: News

A team of 1MCB barristers is assisting six men and one woman in their appeals before the Uganda Court of Appeal.  Each was sentenced to death following their conviction for the robbery and murder of local politician Leonard Isingoma in 2005: the appellants are appealing both conviction and sentence.

The appeals against sentence share a common thread: international jurisprudence requires that, where domestic law permits capital punishment, it must be reserved for ‘the rarest of the rare’.

The appeals against conviction raise a number of distinct grounds. They include the ineffective assistance of counsel where one advocate represented all seven defendants notwithstanding that some of them relied on ‘cut throat’ defences, misdirection as to the burden and standard of proof applicable within a ‘voir dire’ to determine the admissibility of confession evidence, errors in relation to the cross-admissibility of co-defendants’ out of court statements, misdirection as to the meaning of ‘common intention’, and reliance on weak and unreliable circumstantial evidence.

The team is working with Justice Centres Uganda and the Centre for Capital Punishment Studies: it comprises Tanya Murshed, Gwawr Thomas, Alex Chakmakjian, Bernadette Smith and Ariane Adam.

In keeping with our founding commitment to fight fearlessly for access to justice for all members of the community, 1 Mitre Court Buildings is pleased to be supporting the production of a film to raise public awareness of the far-reaching impact of the cuts to public funding for judicial review.   Produced by the Justice Alliance, the film is due to be released in June.

A preview is available here.

To learn more about the Justice Alliance’s campaign to preserve legal aid, see here.

Neelim Sultan is pleased to accept an invitation to speak at the Sixth World Women Lawyers’ Conference, hosted by the Women Lawyers’ Interest Group of the International Bar Association.  The event, to be held in Paris on 8th and 9th May 2014, brings together leading practitioners to share experiences and to discuss how to inspire the next generation of women lawyers.

Neelim will lead a session on negotiation skills in a variety of contexts, including in court and in meetings with clients.

Further information about the conference can be found here.

Tanya Murshed organised and presented at a workshop on sentencing and mitigation in capital cases in Kampala, Uganda on 29th April 2014. The workshop was led by Declan O’Callaghan of Landmark Chambers. Tanya delivered a presentation on the pilot of a scheme of pre-sentence reports and mental health assessments that she introduced at the special re-sentencing session of 136 Kigula beneficiaries last year. The event was held in conjunction with the Uganda Law Society and was attended by lawyers, members of civil society and senior members of the judiciary, including the Head of the Supreme Court of Uganda.

Tanya is the current Uganda Project Director of the Centre for Capital Punishment Studies.

Emmanuel Kalejaiye, represented by John Benson QC and Charles Crinion, was found not guilty by a jury at Chelmsford Crown Court last week (16^th April) of murdering his mother in September of last year.

Mr Kalejaiye was found guilty of manslaughter on the basis of diminished responsibility. The Court had earlier heard evidence that Mr Kalejaiye suffered from paranoid schizophrenia and severe depression.  He will be sentenced in June.

John Benson QC and Charles Crinion were instructed by Ann Blyth-Cook & Co., Southend.

The trial was reported widely in national and local newspapers, including the Daily Mail, BBC News and The Mirror.

The Appellant, SS, had originally been sentenced to 4 months’ imprisonment for possession of cannabis with intent to supply.  He was a low-level street dealer who was essentially seeking to fund his own habit by selling cannabis from a friend’s flat.  The Honorary Recorder of Luton declined to suspend the sentence despite significant mitigation: amongst other factors, the Appellant was aged 19, had no previous convictions, and at the time of the offence had had a chaotic lifestyle, but had since secured full-time employment working six days a week.

The Appellant particularly feared the loss of his employment as a result of an immediate custodial sentence.  On appeal, he was also concerned about the length of time for which he would need to disclose his criminal record and how this would affect his future prospects.

At an expedited hearing, the Court readily agreed that the sentence ought to have been suspended but was further persuaded that in failing to suspend at the outset, the Appellant had lost the opportunity to keep his liberty by complying with Probation.  Therefore, replacing the original sentence with a suspended term of custody was no longer a just outcome.  In the circumstances, it was deemed appropriate to recognise this by imposing a community order instead.  Under new legislation, his conviction will now be spent in a year.

The Appellant was represented by Alex Chakmakjian.

Thirteen “incredibly rare” San Salvador rock iguanas, classed as being in danger of extinction, were seized from within a suitcase at Heathrow Airport last month.  The iguanas, valued at £130,000, had been concealed within socks.

In a case that was widely reported by the media, two young women were arrested whilst transiting a flight from The Bahamas, and were subsequently charged with the fraudulent evasion of a prohibition on importation: see The Guardian’s coverage here.

Gwawr Thomas was instructed on behalf of one of the defendants.

1 Mitre Court Buildings is extremely disappointed by yesterday’s announcement from the Criminal Bar Association and the Circuits.

We note that the agreement was reached two days before the deadline for responding to a consultation on further direct action. We are dismayed that the CBA and the Circuits have acted without a mandate from their membership.

We firmly believe that our fight is about the fundamental issues of access to justice and equality of arms, not merely about the Bar’s earnings.  The draconian and unwarranted cuts to litigators’ fees, together with the introduction of dual contracts, will force the closure of many solicitors’ firms, jeopardising access to justice and diversity within the profession.  We are committed to standing by our solicitor colleagues and, to that end, will be participating in the action of 31st March and 1st April, by declining to appear in magistrates’ courts and refusing returns from Higher Court Advocates choosing not to work on those two days.

Chambers was founded on a commitment to fight fearlessly for access to justice for all members of the community. We firmly believe that the continued provision of legal aid is fundamental to securing that right for everyone, regardless of means, social background, or country of birth.

Over recent years, repeated cuts to legal aid have jeopardised access to justice for the poor and the vulnerable. In keeping with our founding ethos, 1MCB members have been active in campaigning against this assault on our society’s most marginalised groups. In particular, we have:

• refused to attend court on the morning of 6th January and all day on 7th March 2014;
• been well represented at each of the meetings, marches and demonstrations that have been organised by the Criminal Bar Association, the South Eastern Circuit, Justice Alliance, Save UK Justice and the London Criminal Courts Solicitors Association;
• responded (collectively and individually) to each of the consultations that has been issued by the Ministry of Justice;
• lobbied MPs, ministers and the Justice Select Committee;
• sought to raise the profile of the campaign by way of television, radio and webcast interviews, and by publishing articles in both the legal and mainstream press;
• unanimously pledged not to sign up to QASA, nor to undermine our colleagues by accepting briefs on the ‘roll out’ circuits.

In line with our commitment to taking lawful direct action to defeat further cuts, no member of the Crime Team will be available to appear in publicly funded cases in the Crown Court in which they are not the instructed advocate, effective from 7th March 2014. Every effort will be made to inform our instructing solicitors well in advance of hearings which cannot be covered as a result of the instructed advocate being unavailable.

We thank our solicitors for their understanding and loyalty at this time.

On 8th March 2014, Neelim Sultan will be taking part in a panel discussion at Oxford Lawyers Without Borders’ second annual conference.  The theme of the conference is ‘The Rule of Law and International Development’.  Neelim will be addressing the various ways in which the rule of law is fundamental to development, and discussing both the positive and negative impact that developed countries have in that regard.  Joining her on the panel will be Roger Leese, Chair of Advocates for International Development, and Peter van Veen, Director, Business Integrity of Transparency International.

Hilary Lennox successfully defended the rights of a mother before the Family Division of the High Court on 21st February 2014.  Having considered an application to determine whether Ireland or England & Wales was the appropriate forum for the case, Mr Justice Hayden ruled that inherent jurisdiction remained with the Irish Courts, and dismissed an application for wardship of the three children.  Interim care orders in favour of an English local authority, obtained in the London courts, were therefore quashed.  As a result, Hilary’s client and her three children can now remain in Ireland.

Read coverage of this case in The Irish Times, here.

Hilary, who joined Chambers earlier this year, continues to practise at the Irish Bar.

As part of Chambers’ ongoing work with Colombian human rights defenders, 1MCB was pleased to host a roundtable discussion with Rommel Duran Castellano.

Rommel is a human rights lawyer based in Bucaramanga: like many of his colleagues, he regularly faces attacks, threats and stigmatisation on account of his work representing victims of human rights violations in rural areas, where forcibly displaced small-scale producers are attempting to return to the land previously expropriated from them.

Rommel is particularly well known for his work on behalf of the Pitalito community, forcibly displaced in 2010 to make way for palm tree plantations and mining activity.  Further information about the case can be found here.