On Tuesday, 19 August a closed hearing will be held on whether the UK Government's claim of public interest immunity should be upheld and, if so, to what extent. As well as the public, Abdelbaset Megrahi and his lawyers are excluded from this hearing. As I wrote on this blog on 16 July: "This is the very first time of which I am aware in Scottish legal history that a hearing has been convened in a criminal appeal from which the appellant and his legal representatives have been excluded. It should also be the last."
On Wednesday, 20 August there will be a public procedural hearing on the petition lodged by Megrahi's legal representatives for an order according them access to the original trial productions which, contrary to established practice, the Crown has been denying them. It is to be hoped that there will also be an indication of the outcome of the earlier debate on the scope of the current appeal, ie whether it should be confined to the issues on which the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission held that there might have been a miscarriage of justice.
Exclusion from diets or hearings etc.
ReplyDelete89.10.—(1) If the court considers it necessary for the controlled person and his legal
representative, or any other relevant party, to be excluded from a diet or hearing or part of
diet or a hearing to secure that information is not disclosed contrary to the public interest, it
shall–
(a) make an order in that respect; and
(b) conduct the diet or hearing, or that part of it from which the controlled person and
his legal representative are excluded, in private.
(2) The court may otherwise order a diet or hearing to be conducted in private if it thinks
fit.
(3) When the court issues an opinion in any proceedings to which this Chapter applies,
the court may withhold any or part of its reasons if and to the extent that it is not possible to
give reasons without disclosing information contrary to the public interest.
(4) Where an opinion of the court does not include the full reasons for its decision—
(a) the court shall prepare a separate opinion including those reasons; and
(b) the Deputy Principal Clerk shall serve that separate opinion on the Secretary of
State and the special representative.
Nice try. But the Act of Sederunt (Rules of the Court of Session Amendment No. 4) (Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005) 2005, from which this provision is taken, applies to civil proceedings in the Court of Session. It has no relevance whatsoever to criminal proceedings in the High Court of Justiciary.
ReplyDelete