'They've overlooked my child's death': Wrongful prosecutions in fast-track legal procedure

An investigation has found people are being wrongly prosecuted because of flaws in a fast-track legal procedure. ITV News Correspondent Peter Smith has the latest.

Flaws in a fast-track legal procedure are resulting in people being wrongly prosecuted, a joint investigation between ITV News and the Evening Standard can reveal.

We can also report that mistakes in the Single Justice Procedure (SJP) meant at least one person was convicted this year who was already dead.

In response, the former lord chief justice, who oversaw the introduction of the system, is now calling for the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) to deliver urgent reforms.

The SJP was brought in in 2015 to speed up magistrate court decisions, and it is now used for around 40,000 cases every month in England and Wales.

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The SJP, as it is commonly known, is designed to deal with what are perceived to be lower-level crimes.

Just last month, the same system was under scrutiny when 74,000 people were told their prosecutions for alleged rail fare evasion could be overturned.

Now, our joint investigation has uncovered a significant number of "micro miscarriages of justice" - mainly in Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) and TV Licensing offences - where people are being convicted because the prosecuting authorities are not even reading their explanations.

We selected a sample size of 50 cases where defendants with strong extenuating circumstances had still been convicted under the SJP.

We then asked a panel of four criminal barristers to independently review the cases.

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They found almost three-quarters (74%) were not in the public interest to prosecute in the first place.

And nearly one in three (58%) would likely have resulted in a different outcome if the defendant had access to a lawyer in open court.

In one case we examined, a pensioner was prosecuted for not paying his TV Licence, despite explaining in the SJP form he returned that he had been in hospital undergoing heart surgery. He was still convicted.

Another man with learning disabilities wrote on his form that he had tried to make a payment, but struggled to use the online system. His mum made the payment on his behalf, but he was also convicted.

In addition to these 50 cases that were reviewed, we also discovered the case of Jenny Beasley and decided to contact her at her home in Torquay, Devon.

Just a few days before Christmas last year, Jenny had to take her three-month-old baby daughter into hospital due to feeding problems.

But baby Scarlett's condition worsened suddenly, and she passed away unexpectedly.

It was during this period - in the days between seeing her baby die, and then the funeral - Jenny's car insurance lapsed for a single day before she remembered to renew it.

Jenny was still grieving her baby's death when she received a letter from the court telling her she was being prosecuted under the SJP.

In a court, Jenny could have been given legal advice to plead not guilty due to her circumstances, and she'd be given the chance to explain what happened - but that is not the case in this procedure done entirely on paper.

"I felt completely sign-posted to plead guilty," Jenny said.

"I put in the 'mitigating circumstances' that I didn't have insurance for the one day. So I thought, I have to plead guilty, then I'll just explain what happened and they'll understand."

However, Jenny was still convicted.

"They've overlooked my child's death," she said.

"This is the most extreme, horrible thing that's happened in my life, and I would absolutely think that's a mitigating circumstance."

Cases like this are being ruled on by magistrates who are volunteers.

We showed the findings of our investigation to the Magistrates' Association, and they admit mistakes are happening, they say, because prosecutors don't even read the explanations from the people they're trying to convict.

"There isn't that process of the prosecuting authority deciding if it passes the 'public interest test' based on what has been written by the defendant, and that should happen," Tom Franklin, the chief executive of the Magistrates Association, said.

The Magistrates' Association has set out 12 steps for reform to the SJP - the main one being that prosecution authorities must first read the explanations being written by the defendant before deciding if they want to proceed with the case at all.

Mr Franklin said the response from the government so far has been "muted".

The absence of a review from the prosecuting authorities means if a defendant ticks the guilty box and then attempts to explain their "mitigating circumstances", the magistrate cannot undo the guilty plea. In effect, their fate has already been sealed.

In such a case, the magistrate can only take those mitigating circumstances into consideration for a more lenient punishment, but a conviction is a foregone conclusion.

Tristan Kirk at the Evening Standard has been investigating the SJP for the last four years.

He has uncovered evidence of the system wrongfully convicting children, and he thinks it's because speed is being prioritised over justice.

"You find that magistrates are taking less and less time over the decisions they're taking," he said.

"Some cases are being dealt with in 45 seconds.

"It really confirms the suspicion that people have had all along that this is a conveyor belt of justice, rubber stamping people's convictions and fines, without giving them the individual consideration that they really deserve."

Lord Thomas was head of the courts in England and Wales when the SJP was first introduced.

We showed him our analysis, and the former lord chief justice said it raises concerns about the SJP continuing in its current form.

"I think it's clear from what I've seen and from what the Magistrates' Association are saying that there are aspects of this procedure - very important aspects - that need reviewing," he said.

Lord Thomas added he was "disappointed" to see that the SJP had not been reformed before now.

"Fixing this is not difficult," he said.

"It really is something the Ministry [of Justice] and the prosecuting authorities ought to consider with a degree of urgency."

This isn't a story of lives being ruined as a result of mistakes in the system, akin to the Post Office Horizon IT scandal.

Under the SJP, the punishment is often a relatively small fine, but to those who have been convicted, the indignity of it all still matters.

What is similar to what happened with the Post Office, however, is that under the SJP the power to prosecute has been bestowed upon organisations.

In this case, the DVLA or the BBC for TV Licensing offences conduct their own prosecutions through the SJP.

At least one senior source in the DVLA said, off the record, they would likely have dropped many cases if they were aware of the "mitigating circumstances".

The DVLA formally responded to our investigation with a statement, saying: “A Single Justice Procedure notice will only be issued when we have exhausted all other enforcement routes, including issuing multiple items of correspondence, to which the customer can respond to DVLA with their mitigation.

"Once progressed to SJP, any defendant can request a hearing in open court, but those pleading guilty via SJP, including those with mitigating action, are considered by a magistrate. These can be referred back to DVLA but whether or not to do so is a decision taken by the magistrate."

With regard to the prosecution of a deceased person, the DVLA told us they rely on the family or the executor to notify them that the registered keeper of a vehicle has passed away.

A TV Licensing spokesperson said: "TV Licensing's primary aim is to help people stay licensed and avoid prosecution, which is always a last resort.

"All prosecutions brought by TV Licensing are subject to an evidential and public interest test.

"We give customers a number of opportunities to tell us about personal circumstances which may significantly affect their ability to stay licensed before and during the prosecution process, and we would encourage people to engage with us as early as possible so we can properly assess the information given.

"Where appropriate, we have the ability to halt a prosecution or overturn a conviction if we are made aware of new and compelling information."

The MoJ did not agree to an interview but in a statement told us: “The Single Justice Procedure was designed to allow low-level offences to be dealt with simply and without people having to go to court unless they choose to do so.

"The decision to prosecute cases under the Single Justice Procedure is made by the prosecuting authority. This Government is reviewing what more can be done to support vulnerable defendants, as well as how to improve oversight and regulation.”

When asked if they had concerns about a dead person being prosecuted under the Single Justice Procedure, they told us a court cannot knowingly convict someone who has died. And when someone who has died has been prosecuted, that prosecution will be void.

Our investigation has uncovered evidence of a system convicting people who should not have been prosecuted.

Some have been fined, some will pay more for insurance for the rest of their lives because their explanations and pleas for compassion haven't even been read by those prosecuting them.

And despite the flaws we have exposed, this system continues, unreformed, to convict thousands in our courts every week.

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