Majority of criminals plead not guilty to delay a trial
CRIMINALS are exploiting the backlog in court cases by pleading not guilty in the hope their trial is delayed or even dropped, the Met Commissioner has warned.
Sir Mark Rowley suggested defendants who would normally admit their offence were now gambling that the crisis in the criminal justice system would work to their advantage.
Cuts in funding, combined with the pandemic and the barristers’ strike has seen the backlog of criminal cases soar to more than 60,000. It means some trials can take up to two years to be heard, increasing the risk that some victims will decide to walk away and refuse to cooperate.
Sir Mark said in the past as many as 80 per cent of suspects would plead guilty before their case got to trial, but recently that figure had fallen to just 20 per cent in some areas.
He said this was adding to the backlog and making the situation evenworse, with victims of crime forced to wait even longer to get justice.
The impact is likely to be felt most among victims of rape and sexual offences who already face a hugely traumatic ordeal in having to give evidence and are often unable to move on with their lives while the trial is hanging over them.
Campaigners have warned of the danger of victims giving up on pursuing justice because of the delays in the courts system.
During a meeting with Met officers in Central London, Sir Mark said: “The barristers’ strike has been a real challenge for us all. More and more cases are backing up in the system and that’s a real concern to me. I’ve heard that because cases are backing up in the system, struggling defence lawyers are persuading more of their clients to plead not guilty, which is adding to backlogs.
“Someone told me that we were normally having, across all crime, about 80 per cent pleading guilty, 20 percent not guilty, and at the moment it’s the other way round. Particularly for victims of sexual offences that is a problem.”
While criminal courts did sit through the pandemic, often making use of remote technology, it was a skeleton service, with thousands of cases having to be delayed.
Last month members of the Criminal Bar Association began an indefinite strike in protest at years of declining fees. The dispute ended last week when Brandon Lewis, the new Justice Secretary, improved the Government’s offer of a 15 per cent fee increase for new cases.
But Kirsty Brimelow KC, chairman of the Criminal Bar Association, haswarned that the justice system remains “chronically underfunded” and clearing the backlog will take years.