Brown v Director of Public Prosecutions [2019] EWHC 798 (Admin); [2019] 2 Cr.App.R. 6

This case turns on the meaning of the term “issuing”. The Appellant was convicted on 17 August 2018 by the North Staffordshire Magistrates of an offence of speeding contrary to a Local Traffic Order and Sections 84 and 89(1) of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 and Schedule 2 to the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988. He has admitted the facts alleged. The defence advanced, and the basis of the appeal by way of case stated, is that the written charge in the case was not “issued” within the six months period specified by Section 127(1) of the Magistrates’ Courts Act 1980 [“the 1980 Act”].

The Appellant contends that proceedings cannot be “issued” unless and until the relevant document (the written charge) “is in the public domain at least to the extent that it has left the relevant prosecutor’s office”. The Respondent argues that the only way in which to make sense of the wording of [section 29 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 [“the 2003 Act”] is to interpret the word “issuing” as meaning what happens when the written charge is produced by the prosecutor in a form that is ready for service.

Held: “I reject the submission of the Appellant that the issuing of a written charge only arises when the written charge, itself comprised in the document, is posted as the acceptable means of service to the relevant defendant. The “issuing” of the written charge and service are discrete steps, as the legislation and the Criminal Procedure Rules make clear. I also reject the submission that the information contained in the written charge must be in the public domain, in the sense of being placed before a Court or being served, before issue can be held to be complete. That would be to reconstitute the former two-step procedure in a different form. In my judgment, the submission that some intervening steps between the completion of the written charge as a document in its final form, and the service process, could in some way complete the process of “issuing” cannot possibly be right. The only intervening steps might be checking the postal address of the relevant defendant and placing the written charge in an envelope. There is no evidence of the first as part of the process. The second cannot possibly be part of the issuing process. Once it is recognised that the issuing of the written charge and service on the defendant are separate steps, to my mind these arguments make no sense.

I do conclude that the Magistrates were in error, at least technically, in their answer to the first question they formulate. In my view a written charge cannot be regarded as having been issued “when the relevant prosecutor determines to issue it”. Moreover, it seems to me that it is insufficient that there should be “some tangible signification by the prosecutor”. In my view, the written charge can be regarded as issued only when the document comprising the written charge is completed, with all relevant details and in the form needed for service. Provided that is done within six months of the relevant offence, the written charge will have been issued in time.

 It follows that the Justices were right “to decide that the written charge and Single Justice Procedure Notice were issued to the Defendant by the relevant prosecutor on 21 April 2018”. As a consequence, in my view the Appellant’s conviction can stand and I would dismiss the appeal.

It should be noted that, if following issue in time, there is an inordinate or unwarranted or unjustified but significant delay before such a written charge is served, that should not and cannot go without remedy. The remedy is abuse of process. It would be wise for prosecutors, as a matter of practice, to ensure in every case that both the issue and service of Single Justice Procedure Notices are completed before six months from the relevant offences, so as to put paid to any suggestion of such unwarranted delay.”