Christopher Beuckman v. Her Majesty’s Advocate [2015] HCJAC 104

Note of appeal against conviction and sentence:- In February 2015, at Paisley Sheriff Court, the appellant was convicted after trial on indictment of two charges relating to two breaches of a Sexual Offences Prevention Order imposed on 14 July 2014 at Paisley Sheriff Court. The SOPO prohibited the appellant from inter alia “... having contact with any person under the age of 16 years save for inadvertent or unavoidable contact ...”. The appellant was found ‘not proven’ in relation to charge 1 and he was convicted in relation to charge 2. The appellant was sentenced to 18 months detention and given a nine-month supervised release order. The appellant appealed against his conviction and sentence. During the course of the trial the two complainers gave evidence regarding the appellant approaching them individually on subsequent days. The appellant also gave evidence during which he admitted having contact with the complainers on the dates libelled but his position was that he had not known that they were under 16 years of age when he spoke to them. The ground of appeal related to alleged misdirections by the trial sheriff in relation to corroboration and the Moorov doctrine in particular. It was contended that in light of the trial judge’s directions a verdict of acquittal in charge 1 inevitably meant that they were not entitled to convict the appellant in relation to charge 2 and as a result there had been a miscarriage of justice. It was submitted here on behalf of the appellant that the way the sheriff had approached the evidence in his charge meant that it was necessary for the jury to accept both complainers in relation to the separate charges and by convicting the appellant in relation to charge 2 but not charge 1 it was clear the jury had not followed the directions that they had been given. It was further submitted that the sentence imposed was excessive and, even on the complainer’s account, the contact had been minimal, there was no alarm on the part of the complainer and nothing inappropriate had been said. On behalf of the Crown it was submitted that at the close of the Crown case there was a case to answer as the essentials of the charge, namely, that the appellant was subject to a SOPO, and that there had been contact, without reasonable excuse, between the appellant and a child or children under the age of 16, had been spoken to by 2 witnesses and, by the application of the Moorov doctrine at that stage in the trial, there was a sufficiency. Thereafter the appellant had given evidence in which he admitted that he had spoken to the complainers albeit it was his position he did not know that they were under 16. Here the court refused the appeal against conviction. The court noted that there was a clear sufficiency of evidence at the close of the Crown case and thereafter the appellant gave evidence and, as such, for each charge there was now the evidence of each complainer together with the evidence of the appellant who accepted speaking with each of them and the jury were therefore able to simply apply the rules of corroboration which the sheriff had dealt with in his charge, rather than them having to apply the Moorov doctrine. In relation to the appeal against sentence it was allowed to the extent that the court agreed that the length of the sentence was excessive and quashed the sentence and substituted a period of detention of 12 months with a supervised release order of 6 months.