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Sam Hallam and Jemima Umo and their phones

The case of Sam Hallam provides an insight into a reinvestigation conducted by one police force (Thames Valley Police, instructed by the CCRC), which reviewed an investigation by another force (the Metropolitan Police). Sam Hallam was convicted of murder, conspiracy to commit grievous bodily harm and violent disorder, following a gang fight on 11 October 2004 at about 20.30 hours in East London, in which another young man, Essayas Kassahun, was killed. The case against him at his trial rested on identification evidence provided by two witnesses. ‘The weaknesses in their evidence were such that independent supporting evidence was, in practice, essential.’ [1] Hallam ’s defence was that he was with his friend Timmy Harrington on day of the murder , but Harrington denied this, and the prosecution alleged that he had concocted an alibi. This was the supporting evidence.  Hallam appealed in 2006, but his conviction was upheld. He then applied to the CCRC to have his case reviewed. ...
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Engaging with the Enemy

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Engaging with the Enemy, or Back to the Bad Old Days: pre-charge engagement [ an updated version of this article is available on the Justice Gap website] Do new rules, which allow both prosecutors and defendants and their lawyers to meet and discuss what enquiries the police should make, mark the start of a cooperative search for truth and justice, or are they a means of returning to the old days when the police made deals with suspects who were kept in order by their own lawyers?  The idea of pre-charge engagement seems to have arisen as a partial solution to the serious and continuing problems besetting the process of disclosure in criminal cases. The disclosure of evidential material (documents, digital records, video recordings etc.) to defendants by prosecutors of any material which might support the defence case or undermine the prosecution case, and the police enquiries which gather material relating to crimes, are governed by the Criminal Proceedings and Investigat...
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Location: Pitsmoor, Sheffield S4 7AW, UK
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Reinvestigation of criminal cases

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what I'm working on with my assistant Clara Working assumptions: the two axioms of reinvestigation The first axiom that reinvestigators should adopt is that the police investigate crimes as thoroughly as they can, and are limited in the extent of their investigations only by the availability of resources and operational restraints. We should make it clear that we adopt a fundamental assumption that the police investigate crimes systematically, thoroughly and intelligently, taking advantage of their training, staff with specialised knowledge, methods and systems of investigations, techniques of surveillance, informants (registered and unregistered) and other resources at their disposal. We recognise also that police resources are limited, a factor which may limit the scope of investigations. We acknowledge the competence and dedication of police officers, but not necessarily their integrity. We also recognise that some officers may break rules or fit up innocent suspects, be...
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