'Urgent' action on witness rules
The need to protect the identities of witnesses in certain court cases will be addressed "very urgently", Justice Secretary Jack Straw has said.
Mr Straw told BBC Radio 4's Today programme he was very concerned about a ruling by the Law Lords that restricts the use of anonymous witnesses.
The ruling quashed a murder conviction of a man who was convicted with the aid of anonymous evidence.
Police have warned that serious criminals could walk free as a result.
As usual pros and cons.
ReplyDeleteFact of the matter is that we are moving in a Kafkaesque fashion to a situation where 'we can be detained indefinitely without charge on the evidence of an anonymous grass'
We saw that in Forrestgate where the the brothers were fingered by a copper's nark who received bars of chocolate and telephone cards as a reward for his lies.
'Curveball' who confirmed the Iraq WMD lies was similar.
We don't need it. Jack Straw does.
If I was being accused of a crime, I would certainly want to know who was doing the accusing.
ReplyDeleteThe assumption here, seems to be that the person in the dock is guilty and giving a witness anonymity just helps the Police in getting them rightly banged up, which of course is not Justice.