Any Idea's

[mouse]

Tapes

Wow, long time to find info...still not impossible, Data requests to CPS & others that were involved at the time might turn up something. Solicitors I believe are required to keep records for 20 years. Good luck.

[LS]

It is currently twelve years.

[Rights Fighter]

The best person to advise is your solicitor.

I know from my experience that some trial tapes are kept for six years having had some preserved well after the five year period and the sixth is nearly up. In Mouse's experience she says five so possibly it differs from courts and/or transcribers.

[mouse]

Trial Tapes

Official Government rules is 5 years unless for some reason, CCRC it has been requested they be kept.

I made a formal complaint because up until I enquired it transpired there was no means of monitoring this or in fact ckecking the whereabouts of tapes.

Upto 2006 tapes etc. could be disposed of by the transcription Company after 5 years without any records being kept. This loophole was obviously tightened after my enquiries.

You have good and bad transcription Company's the one I was dealing with was in total chaos with one of their workers telling me on the phone that my tapes were there but they were aall thrown in a room where they had been transferred from their Liverpool office and there was no chance of finding anything.

Pressure to get my tapes ended up with the fact that they had been destroyed (this was one month over the 5 year deadline) and that there was nothing I could do about it.

If anyone doubts the five years then I have the official notification and it is better to be safe than sorry.

I am not saying that if its over five years not to try, as I said there are many transcription Company's and some are not so 'efficient' shall we say.

[mouse]

Solicitors records,

Thanks for that, I know my solicitor in 1998 told me it was 20 but obviously these things change, I don't know if they legally have to keep them that long, do you? I know business records have to be kept 6 years by law.

[Rights Fighter]

Possibly then it depends on the company as I know from experience that trial tapes have successfully been preserved on the request of a solicitor (or the client) within months of the six years coming to a close.

One company in London (Harry Counsell) apparently had a fire a few years back and that destroyed all tapes up to and including the year of the fire.

CCRC can in some circumstances get hold of the trial judge's handwritten notes and those of either or both counsel. This has happened very recently in a case I sent to CCRC which is now being referred to CA (hearing in December we think). Conviction was in 1999 so obviously no tapes at all so they managed to track down some of the handwritten notes.

[Rights Fighter]

Some sols will only keep paperwork/records for six years and then destroy them. I've known a few that have done that - apparently that is the minimum recommended time as per Law Society according to sols who have told me that.

Again it's always best to check. I've written to several sols trying to track down paperwork pertaining to one client and managed to get some copies from a couple of sols whereas other sols had destroyed theirs. Conviction 1998.

[justcoping]

Just to let you know, I spoke to the DS on my case and the only file's that are around are the police file's. It seems the police come under different rule's and they have to keep their records for 100 yrs ( lucky for me).

[Rights Fighter]

Really!!!!! How interesting!

Then that would explain why some appeals against conviction succeed when allegations made years before that were considered to be "inconsistent" or "unreliable" and later resurrected, resulting in a conviction, but the police have destroyed the previous records, so the trial was deemed to be unfair.

I am currently going through some trial paperwork and found a stack of case references where appeals succeeded on that ground - that previous allegations made to the police could not be substantiated so the defendant could not possibly confirm or deny what was said back then, and if it had changed, and to what degree.

How typical to dress up that ground as it is, rather than suggest that the police have "accidentally" destroyed records that might have assisted the defence case.


Justcoping on the other note - the police records is all that there is - that may well be as far as they are concerned. However, CCRC have powers, as I said previously, to investigate the possibility of handwritten notes made by the trial judge and either or both counsel, made at the time of trial.

[justcoping]

From what I have been told by the DS in my case, she kept coming up againnst obstructions ( CPS not being very helpful), so she went to her superior, who then went to the borough commander who the went to the assistant commisioner of police and that is when thing's stated to move a bit quicker.

[Rights Fighter]

And so they should.

I think she may well be embarrassed that the police got it so wrong all those years ago and although she was not personally involved, is a damn good officer who wants to put this massive wrong, right.

[justcoping]

And so they should.

I think she may well be embarrassed that the police got it so wrong all those years ago and although she was not personally involved, is a damn good officer who wants to put this massive wrong, right.

I think you may be right there, nothing seems to be to much trouble for her, she has given me quite a bit of her time already, that has been for support and not just for an impact statement.

[Rights Fighter]

She sounds like one of the decent police officers.

Unfortunately there are too many who are more interested in furthering their careers than getting to the truth.

Out of interest, before your conviction, how were you treated by the investigating officers?

[justcoping]

Their opinion was that I had committed the offence, even the PC that put me in the police cell appeared to have the same opinion.

[Rights Fighter]

It is currently twelve years.

As there seems to be some difference between what we all think is the correct time for solicitors to keep trial paperwork I asked a barrister about this on a forum he runs.

This was his reply:

The are no fixed times. They are kept by and large for six years. Some will be kept longer, and some forever.

Much of the file remains a client's property, and his c;aim to their return lasts six years.

So the six years I was referring to was that the client's claim to the trial paperwork lasts for six years.

So I got it wrong regarding the set time for sols to keep the paperwork as there is no set time, and sols can choose that themselves. However, I knew that there was a six year rule there somewhere - and that was the client's claim for retrieving his or her own paperwork from them.