Advice on steps you should take if you are falsely accused. (Based on my own experience)

[Itsnotallbad]

It'll take some time. But if you know you're innocent,do everything you can to make sure justice prevails and you get your life back!

[Mr B]

Hi- I also have a son innocent of the accusation - we're still at the bail stage - I'm trying to be very hopeful. Part of what's getting my son through this are his plans to prove her the liar she is - in court. I haven't the heart to tell him that that just isn't possible. What are the laws about contacting one's accuser, or their family directly, after the case has been dropped - asking for fair recompense ? Stating an intention of taking them to court for defamation etc ? Just a little of the pressure back at them - or is all that not allowed.

Regarding defamation I can give you a potted summary
DISCLAIMER: The following is NOT legal advice just my limited experience.
[1] Costs - if you are a private client you will expect to incur up to 70K costs if it goes all the way to High Court. Double that if no win no fee (Conditional Fee Agreement). If you are successful & win, costs will be "assessed" by the Court" you may still be liable for 30-50%. Now that stings...
[2] If you loose then you pay all (your & her) costs.
[3] Court fees are 5% of the amount you are claiming for in damaged. So for around 50K of damages hence 2500 GBP just in fees.
[4] You can apply for summary judgement by the Court in case the FA does not defend itself.
[5] Before actioning anything in Court you have to execute a "Pre Action Protocol Letter of Claim" that has to be physically served to the FA (By a process server") & would benefit from an afadavit to ensure good service was executed.
[7] You have one year from the date of the first defamation to issue to Court
[8] Libel can be defended against using "qualified privilege", so a Mother with a young child can tell other Mothers with Young Children that you are a child molester (without proof) & rely upon qualified privilege. However if they tell a woman who does NOT look after young children they are open to challenge by libel as there is no "qualified privilege" in this simple example
[9] The decision to pursue will not just be on the strength of your case but also the degree of financial wealth the FA has. If you win the only remedy is Financial & you cannot readily realise that if the FA does not have the 140K + your desired damages - say 200K in ready CASH. If they own a house outright, you could get a charging order that becomes a deferred possession order (as a youngster living in the house cannot be thrown out) but then you are still liable for ALL your costs. You will be waiting along time.

Libel is a really rich mans law. For regular mortals you may find it disappointing. I did.

If you are rich then go for it. If not, save your money.
DISCLAIMER: The above is NOT legal advice just my limited experience.
HTH
Mr B

[Franticwithworry]

Hi- I also have a son innocent of the accusation - we're still at the bail stage - I'm trying to be very hopeful. Part of what's getting my son through this are his plans to prove her the liar she is - in court. I haven't the heart to tell him that that just isn't possible. What are the laws about contacting one's accuser, or their family directly, after the case has been dropped - asking for fair recompense ? Stating an intention of taking them to court for defamation etc ? Just a little of the pressure back at them - or is all that not allowed.

So far as I know there's no law stopping your son contacting his accuser after the case has been dropped or after trial, but it's not to be recommended. He would run the risk of angering his FA who could then simply come up with more accusations that would need to be investigated - and the cycle would be repeated.

Keeping a wide berth is the best thing to do, however difficult it is. This advice even applies to family accusers. Once an accusation is made it alters relationships for ever.

[bonbon]

In order to give you an idea of what it is like to be accused of sexual assault, I've written the following to hopefully help you get through the ordeal and come out the other side. It is very long, but stick with it as there are a lots of important things you need to know. It is split across two posts because it is so long so please continue to read the following too.

My ordeal started the day after Christmas when a family argument broke out, there are a lot of background details relevant to the circumstances but for the sake of brevity I'll keep what happened quite short.

An argument broke out between my mother-in-law and her daughter, my wife's youngest sister (who I will call my sister-in-law). So my sister-in-law ran away, and we got a call saying could we help find her, as we'd passed her a few minutes earlier we knew where she was heading. So we found her and she was quite upset, she told us she was having problems at home and didn't want to go back.

But we took her home and during a conversation that took place I was set upon and made a scapegoat for all the problems going on at her home. At the time the allegations were of touching her bum, looking back retrospectively and going on what was said in court I must have misread the situation as when the allegations came out I didn't take them seriously.

My wife was pregnant at the time and I didn't want to stress my wife out out so I said sorry to my sister-in-law to appease the situation, something which was used against me in court, but I made it clear in court that I didn't say sorry for what was being alleged, I was merely trying to defuse the situation to avoid a confrontation.

A few days passed and we were asked to go back to the house to discuss the allegations, this is where the story changed, and more was alleged to have happened. I was basically told that day that the police would be called and that these allegations would be "taken all the way to the top" which was something my mother-in-law would say, yet it was my sister-in-law who said this, which stood out to both me and my wife as an unusual thing for my sister-in-law to say as she is autistic.

Obviously being worried I went straight to the police station and gave the police the heads up that these allegations were being made, I disclosed a full account of what was said and that what was being alleged was untrue, this wasn't a police interview, this was an informal disclosure, but because no complaint had been made at this time the police could not do anything. During the trial the officer I spoke to gave evidence in the form of a statement, and this was important as my mother-in-law claimed I had gone to hand myself in, and the officer confirmed this was not the case.

The matters were starting to worry me so I contacted www.falselyaccused.co.uk but I was told Stephen Cooper could not help me until I was charged. Stephen Cooper also advised me to seek legal advice.

A few days after I was called by the police who said they needed to speak to me straight away, they didn't give me much choice on date or time, it was basically come down voluntarily when the police say, or be arrested.

I looked around to find the most reputable criminal law firm local to me and I came across Fosters Solicitors of Norwich. I arranged a meeting with them to discuss what had been alleged, again at this time the full extent of the allegations were unknown so Fosters couldn't do much.

A few more days passed and then I attended the voluntary police interview where I was cautioned, Fosters sent a legal representative from a different legal firm to represent me which I was not happy about as I wanted my solicitor to be there.

During the interview I was asked a series of upsetting questions, and accused of lots of different things, this is the third time the stories had changed, and I focused on the allegations as the police put them to me, and gave as much information as I could, which was important as I later found out that the jury get a copy of what was said at the police station, but they don't get a copy of what the claimant says, so what I said to the police was really important.

My legal advisor had advised me to answer the questions and not give much detail, but I wanted to cooperate fully with the police so went against his advice, I think this was a very good decision I made, as the information I provided gave the jury a lot of background information on as to how the allegations came about.

I was sent on my way and I hoped that now I had told the police my side of the story they would be understanding and no further action would be taken.

My wife was then questioned, and she gave her account of one of the allegations made against me.

After that the police had changed their attitude towards me, in their eyes I was a criminal.

I was then called a few days later and told that I had to attend the police station again as I was being charged with 3 counts of sexual assault and that I needed to be bailed, so I attended the police station, was read my rights, and unconditionally bailed.

Being worried, I instead talked to a friend at work about the allegations. This was a big mistake as I walked into the office the next day and everyone talking about it. I didn't lose my job but I felt my trust had been broke and I was treat differently ever since.

Then I found out that the police had been sending letters to an address where I can't receive mail, they knew this was the case, but didn't care. I had to find out from my wife's older sister that I'd been summoned to the magistrate court and I had to get the dates from her too.

I phoned Fosters to make them aware of the circumstances and they had not been made aware that I was summoned to court either, so it was just luck that I even found out I was summoned to court.

Fosters invited me back to their office to apply for legal aid, the process was slightly complicated because my wife is self-employed, so we weren't even sure if legal aid would be granted. Much to my surprise, as I'd been given horror stories about legal aid, it was granted two days later. Fosters had done a good job of ensuring everything the legal aid agency required was provided so that legal aid could be granted quickly.

Me and my solicitor attended the hearing at the magistrate court where we were told the case was too serious to be dealt with in the magistrate court and that I had a choice of whether to go to the high court to be tried by a judge or the crown court and be tried in front of a jury. I didn't really understand the difference but my solicitor advised going in front of a jury so I took his advice.

The difference is much more than that, in high court they look at all the evidence, regardless of whether it is based on assumptions or not, nothing is withheld from the judge and see's everything on face value. If the case goes to crown court both the prosecution and defence can object to information being shared with the jury which is based on assumptions, can be prejudicial or is not considered relevant. You may find a lot of your defence is considered irrelevant by the judge and that your case is weakened, so the more you can say in your defence the better. Ignore people when they say you are just looking for an excuse, they don't know better than you as to why these allegations were made against you so tell all.

It felt that while in court everyone wanted me to plead guilty, almost as if I would win a prize or something for doing so, but I was sticking to my guns, I had done nothing and accept how serious things will get when I plead not guilty.

After the case went to crown court, it felt like eternity passed, nothing seemed to happen for ages.

My wife was now heavily pregnant and that became the focus. She went up north (300 miles away) without me to attend a family funeral, I didn't attend to avoid a confrontation as I knew some of the family members who had took a grudge with me would be there.

My wife was attacked at the funeral, punched in the head and her car was damaged, causing her to bleed down below, so my wife returned home early very worried.

The day my wife returned my sister-in-law's boyfriend smashed a window where me and my wife lived. At this point my wife had not said what had happened up north, and I was livid that my window was broken. The police were refusing to do anything and I knew that if something was not done the situation would get worse so I retaliated and smashed one of the windows where sister-in-law's boyfriend lived.

My sister-in-law's boyfriend phoned the police and said I ran him over and dragged him down the road, so armed response were sent out to arrest me, I was then held at the police station where they wanted to take samples of my hair to prove I smashed the window. I told the police the truth that I went over to confront my sister-in-law's boyfriend and ended up smashing his window and that I did not run him over as he didn't even come out the house.

The two events caused my wife to go into early labour a few days later.

My son was born at 6 months gestation, with solid lungs, unable to breath and was on life support in intensive care. For the first day of him being born, I never got to hold him, he was briskly whipped away without me being given the opportunity to meet him, he was too ill.

My son would spend the next 10 weeks in intensive care on a range of different medications, treatments and undergoing operation after operation.

I was sent to the magistrate courts where I pleaded guilty and was fined for breaking the window.

Stress was starting to take a toll on me, and I stopped sleeping at night.

My son finally was allowed to come home, this helped a bit and took the edge off things, not sleeping at night meant I could look after my son while my wife slept, so it worked out pretty well for us both.

I changed jobs to try and break the cycle of the abuse I was getting at work, and I tried my best to get on with life while chasing up my legal team to make sure things were happening.

Over time I started to struggle with not sleeping at night, having a crying baby at home and working throughout the day, all of which was causing exhaustion, work could see it and were reasonable with me, but I was putting on a brave face as I really felt like I was cracking up.

I started to worry about my legal representation, because I had been appointed a different solicitor who didn't seem to care about the case and there had been a couple of mentions in court and each time a different barrister would turn up and tell the judge they knew nothing about the case. It felt very much like Fosters were doing a run of the mill representation, doing as little as required in order to be able to claim money against the legal aid in place.

Some of the things that stood out was how long it took for my solicitor to respond to me by email, her reassurances that nothing needed to be done, the defence case statement which was a paragraph in size when it should be pages in length, and that we had only met once and during that time she took a statement from me, which was missing a lot of information and had some bits incorrectly typed.

I started to worry more and more as it dawned on me my legal representation was not working, and this is exactly what I didn't need. I started suffering from anxiety and depression which at the time was itself worrying me, so I went to the doctors who prescribed me with anti-depressants.

Continued on the next post...

[bonbon]

...continued from previous post

Feeling I needed more than just tablets, I phoned Stephen Cooper from Falsely Accused again and told him I need some support to which he replied it isn't support I need it is a good legal representation. I told him how things had progressed with my current legal team and he too had serious concerns with them and recommended I contact Rustem Guardian Solicitors. Not knowing he worked for them, I was under the impression he was just some guy who had been through this himself and I trusted his advice as being impartial and independent. Stephen Cooper misrepresented himself completely as I later found out he works for them.

I gave it a few days to have a think on things and while this happened I went to the doctors to have some blood tests to make sure the anti-depressants were not affecting me adversely, but I found that day on one of the tests that the tablets were having an effect on my liver and the test would be needed to be repeated again in 2 weeks to see if it was the tablets or something else.

Later that day, needing some good news, I contacted Rustem Guardian and was put in touch with Timur Rustem, referred to as Tim by himself and others, Tim came across really well and strived in confidence. His confidence rubbed off on me during the call and I thought things were about to take a turn for the better. I was told by Tim that he would contact Fosters and so I didn't need to worry about keeping in contact with them anymore.

Four weeks passed and I heard nothing from Rustem Guardian, but Fosters were chasing me up to arrange a conference with a barrister, the first time Fosters had proactively done something since the case went to the crown court. During this time I continuously tried to get in touch with Tim and was told he was in court or busy and would contact me back but never did.

Then Fosters sent me an e-mail saying if I continued to ignore them they would contact the court and tell them that they had lost contact with me. This was when I phoned Rustem Guardian and called them 4 or 5 times a day to try and get Tim to get in touch with me.

Tim finally contacted me back, didn't remember who I was and wanted to go through everything again, he was quick to blame his internships for the lack of communication and mix up and said he was getting new internships soon. Tim said he would contact Fosters and that in the meantime if I wanted to contact Fosters and explain the situation I could. Tim said that if I did I should give clear reasons as to why I was leaving them to avoid any problems with getting legal aid revoked, as the intention was to instruct Rustem Guardian privately.

So I did that, I contacted Fosters telling them that they were failing to represent me in the way I had hoped and that I just hoped that they did not put others in the same position they put me in especially when I am innocent and that there would be others in the same boat. I was polite in explaining where I felt they had failed to do as much as they could as I had a good relationship with my initial solicitor.

Fosters did not take the news well, and proceeded to withdraw legal aid.

At this point I had no legal representation, Tim said he was willing to represent me, but said he picks his clients and he will only represent those who he likes, what he means here is if you are a fellow muslim brother like he is then you will be represented, and if you are not muslim you will be screwed over. Tim is the kind of person who has no problem representing grooming gangs who attacked lots of young children in Rotherham, but doesn't give a care in the world for people who are truly innocent.

I was still quietly confident at this point as I thought Tim would take me on and we would be able to build a good defence case together.

I then went back to the doctors, had more tests and found that a few days later that my liver was failing and that I needed to change my medication, an appointment was made to see the doctors and it was made very quickly and I was told that I should not stop my medication until I had seen the doctor, but I was at the point now where if I took the tablets I was going to take them all, so I binned them to stop me doing anything stupid. I was becoming agoraphobic and didn't want to leave the house so I didn't attend the second appointment.

Then I had another setback, the place I lived was privately owned but the land the property was on was on a lease so we had a contract giving us permission to be there under certain conditions, but my sister-in-law's boyfriend had contacted them and told them what I had been charged with and me and my wife were given an eviction notice as the allegations meant we were in breach of our contract.

So we now had to find another place to live, I didn't think things could get any worse, and Christmas was only a week away.

My son took ill with bronchiolitis so me and my wife took him to hospital as he was having problems breathing, and during that time a mark appeared on his face, the hospital couldn't work out what it was so called social services.

To sum up where things are at, it was Christmas, I had a sick son, social services forced us to take special measures so we couldn't spend Christmas at home as we needed "supervision", we were being evicted, I had no legal team, I was ill from my liver, legal aid had made us flat broke due to the £820 a month contributions we had to pay, and I now have a criminal record. All of this happened in the space of a year.

Hoping for a better new year, we pushed Rustem Guardian to take on the case and they did. I met with Tim and the barrister who would be representing me, Tim explained the costs would be around £7,200 which included VAT. I thought great! I can give him £3k now and pay the rest later.

Tim then said the costs could go up and we could be looking at a lot more and given my financial circumstances I would be best off pushing to adjourn the trial, so that was the route we decided to go down.

We found a new place and moved, things were starting to look up again, social services had backed down realising we were good parents, and my stress levels reduced.

But that was not the end of it, trouble seemed to be following me no matter where I went, next on the list was the new neighbours complaining about our cars and more threats being made against me and my wife, to which the police had to get involved, but this was the least of my worries, I was trying to stay positive as things were looking up in the case.

Tim had said he had found a barrister who was friends with the judge, and that she would go well in my favour because she was a female and this would come across better to the jury, he said to get as many character witnesses as possible to speak on my behalf in court because the more time spent speaking by others would detract from what I was being accused of. Tim also said that we should focus on the strengths in my defence to avoid watering down the important points. So he talked the talk but came across slightly corrupt.

There was a ground rules hearing coming up as my sister-in-law was granted special measures due to her autism and the discussions taking place started to focus on how we were going to avoid giving the judge what he wanted. Tim had this master plan that if I was forced to represent myself at the ground rules hearing, we would not have to give the judge a list of questions and it would hopefully result in the trial being moved, which would give me time to save some money allowing me to pay for a better defence.

The day before the ground rules hearing Tim asked for £7,200 to be paid on that day, and I asked "do you accept credit cards?" as that is the only way I can pay this at such short notice and he said no and that I had to go down the bank and make the payment directly into his bank account to which I said I couldn't because I was at work and the bank would be closed by the time I finish.

Tim phoned again at 7pm and asked if the payment had been made and I said no, so he said he would call me back.

I never got a call until the next morning where I was told I now had no choice but to go to court and represent myself, as up until now I wasn't sure whether this master plan of Tim's, that he said he had done to other clients but was "risky", was going to go ahead or not. So that morning I had to pull a sick day from work as I didn't have a holiday booked.

I attended the court and to my surprise a barrister turned up. I was confused, so I told the barrister everything and he then disappeared for a bit and came back and said that I was right and he needed to go now, he wasn't too impressed. Tim blamed this on a "mix up" in a text message to me, and then ignored all 4 text messages I sent him after that.

So this was it, I was left to represent myself in the ground rules hearing. The judge was now pissed off big style, he told me that my barrister had left court and was unwilling to represent me because I had not put my legal team in funds and that I had a month to find a new legal team. I was like "what???" and then the prosecution barrister showed me Tim's e-mail which said he would do his best to keep the trial on schedule and that I had failed to pay him multiple times when he requested me to.

The judge then instructed the prosecution barrister to assist me in finding a new legal team, and said I was wasting his time, and that he knew what I was up to, and that I was a very intelligent person, and that the trial would not be moved unless a legal team put in an application to do so in a constructive manner outlining good reasons to have the trial adjourned to a later date.

So I'm thinking "Great!" (sarcastically in my head), just all I needed, a month to go, no legal team and a pissed off judge.

The prosecution barrister said I needed to get myself into town today and go around all the criminal law firms in person to find a legal team who would be willing to represent me. During the conversation we bumped into the court advocate for a local law firm, and the prosecution barrister said use them, they will do, but coming from the prosecution barrister I didn't trust what was said.

So I went home, I phoned lots of different legal teams, including Chris Saltrese Solicitors on the advice of the user Rights Fighter, but nobody would take me on if I was to be funded by legal aid, and they were all quoting £30k+ to be represented privately. I was given lots of different excuses as I contacted over 40 different legal teams, I had people telling me there was not enough time to apply for legal aid, others said that Fosters had told them I had sent abusive e-mails to Fosters so they couldn't take me on which I have the e-mails to show I was to the point but never abusive, and the last excuse I got was that it would be negligent to take me on with such a short space of time left.

Chris Saltrese Solicitors were the most helpful, they clarified a lot of information, and I took a call from ****** who is one of the people working for Chris Saltrese and she called me at 9pm while she was putting her children to bed and went out of her way to help me get legal representation, but her efforts amounted to nothing because I couldn't afford to pay £30k+ in legal fees.

So that was it, I was representing myself, I would have to represent myself in a trial in which I could have my liberty and son taken away. A case where I was looking at a 2 year custodial sentence for some lies a brat of a child was spreading about me.

The next night my wife walked in the house when I was trying to take mine and my sons life. She was gobsmacked, scared, crying and really upset. My wife could not believe what she was seeing, she knew she had to do something, she had came just at the right time, otherwise we would have both been dead.

My wife cancelled work, stuck me in the car with my son, and we driven to Scotland for a holiday.

On the way up in the car, we got a call from the firm that the prosecution barrister put us in touch with saying they were not going to take us on either because legal aid would need to be applied for and it was complicated because my wife is self-employed.

The drive was 17 hours and during that time it gave me time to clear my head, we spent a few days in Scotland, and then came home. We got back at 6am and I had work at 10am. I went to work not knowing what the **** I was going to do.

That lunch time I went back to the local firm which again as mentioned earlier the prosecution put me in touch with, Saunders Goodin Riddleston, and I arranged it so that my wife and son turned up at the same time, and we begged that they took us on. The receptionist was really sympathetic and said she would speak to someone to see if they could do anything.

That day I got a call saying I needed to come back to complete a legal aid application. Thinking the first legal application went smoothly I was optimistic legal aid would be granted a second time despite being told on many occasions this is unlikely to happen and some solicitors had even said they had never heard it be done before.

By this point we had 2 weeks to go before the trial, still had no legal representation and no way to fund it.

I written to the judge, going to court and handing the letter in personally, asking the judge to do what he could to help get legal aid granted, I never got a response and I was told by the court that the letter was not urgent so it would be picked up as and when the judge had the time to read it,

Legal aid started giving us the run around, they said they needed more documents from us, and each time they did 2 days passed each time. My new solicitors were trying their hardest but were saying to me it was looking unlikely it would be granted in time, and that even if it was, finding a barrister at such short notice was unlikely to happen.

Continued on the next post...

[bonbon]

...continued from previous post

Eventually, the legal aid agency gave in after several calls to them, and granted legal aid, asking for £13,776 worth of contributions, or £2,310 a month for the next 6 months, which is more than I get paid! I couldn't give a **** by this point, I was just glad it was granted.

The news just kept getting better, my solicitors had found a barrister, they said it wasn't their first choice but they would do their best to build a case in 6 days, not 6 working days, 6 straight days, this included Saturday and Sunday.

By this point I had used up all my holidays with work, and work still did not know what was going on because I learned from the last occasion to keep my mouth shut.

We attended a hearing which the judge set to go through my defence, and the judge blocked around 50% of my defence from being used for various different reasons, he was already annoyed with me and the impression I got was he just wanted to see me sent down.

My barrister, Lynne Shirley, didn't bite, she worked very hard day and night, often meeting me the next day with bloodshot eyes and a massive amount of work that even I could not have done in that time, I jokingly referred to her as robocop as she was amazing.

My defence wasn't great though, there were lots of things we couldn't do that we wanted to do because we had ran out of time, the only saving grace was that the prosecution didn't have much of a case either.

Lynne worked so hard, she made herself ill, she started to lose her voice and was looking physically drained, yet she stayed focused and inspired me to keep focused. My barrister offered me lots of advice and worked with me to help me give the best evidence I could when on the stand.

Lynne never stopped, she was relentless, she organised my witnesses at very short notice, and had my wife take to the stand which was at my wife's request, Lynne recommended against it but my wife wanted to give evidence, I should have taken Lynne's advice as my wife gave evidence which was not in my favour, but I was happy because she told the truth and that is all that mattered to me.

Lynne had a hard time with the judge too, he stopped us from asking my sister-in-law a lot of questions, giving us just 20 minutes to cross examine her.

At this point the best I hoped for was a hung jury.

Then the trial started, and the prosecution gave a good case to my surprise, but it was all based on lies. I took notes throughout the trial and so did my barrister, we pointed out, using photos from Facebook, where the prosecution had lied, and this ultimately won over the jury. The judge directed the jury to find me guilty as he read a very prosecution bias summary of the case.

The jury did not buy any of what the judge said. I was found not guilty on all 5 counts, 2 counts were specimen counts which the prosecution had added to try and ensure I was sent down. The jury took 3 hours to come to a unanimous verdict of not guilty, they accepted that my sister-in-law was lying, the photos alone proved this, and I'm now free to get on with my life again.

So never give up hoping, stay strong, and just keep trying. 6 days was enough time to build a defence for me, don't let anyone tell you otherwise. I beat all odds, and I'm here now to tell my story. I've learned a lot from my experience, and I'm here to support others who are going through the same.

[Mrs Forgetful]

The matters were starting to worry me so I contacted www.falselyaccused.co.uk but I was told Stephen Cooper could not help me until I was charged. Stephen Cooper also advised me to seek legal advice.

I keep seeing this name popping up - please do not use him! I know people in prison who have paid out lots of money and got nothing in return. he and RG solciitors are hand in hand they get clients for each other. They have such a bad rep in some of the prisons

[Rights Fighter]

Tim finally contacted me back, didn't remember who I was and wanted to go through everything again, he was quick to blame his internships for the lack of communication and mix up and said he was getting new internships soon. Tim said he would contact Fosters and that in the meantime if I wanted to contact Fosters and explain the situation I could. Tim said that if I did I should give clear reasons as to why I was leaving them to avoid any problems with getting legal aid revoked, as the intention was to instruct Rustem Guardian privately.

If you were going to be a private client with Rustem Guardian sols, why would he have any concern about your legal aid being revoked? That makes no sense at all.

Tim had said he had found a barrister who was friends with the judge, and that she would go well in my favour because she was a female and this would come across better to the jury, he said to get as many character witnesses as possible to speak on my behalf in court because the more time spent speaking by others would detract from what I was being accused of. Tim also said that we should focus on the strengths in my defence to avoid watering down the important points. So he talked the talk but came across slightly corrupt.

Utter rubbish! I've seen some awful female barristers fail and some great male barristers win and vice versa.

To say that having lots of character witnesses speaking on your behalf would detract from what you were being accused of - well words fail me. What utter unbelievable claptrap!!

Tim then said the costs could go up and we could be looking at a lot more and given my financial circumstances I would be best off pushing to adjourn the trial, so that was the route we decided to go down.

It wouldn't be up to him to have the trial adjourned, the decision would be made by the trial judge. And an adjournment would be in the sol's best interests as he could then charge you more......

It is utterly unbelievable how some of the charlatans work..... and yet it is allowed..... ye gods and little fishes....

[bonbon]

My judge didn't even allow character references to be read out by the people who wrote them, and wanted the prosecution barrister to read them out, I was not happy so said I wanted to call my character references as witnesses, so the judge said it was a waste of time and if I found it more acceptable my defence barrister could read out the character references. Dealing with Rustem Guardian felt very much like a sales pitch all the way through and my concerns grew the longer I the case went on.

[Rights Fighter]

Defence usually calls one or two character witnesses. Too many and it can appear to be like a fan club giving evidence and can work the other way.

Prosecution counsel would never read defence character witness statements. Some are often read by defence and as I said, some give live evidence. Sometimes the judge will remind the jury of character witness statements.

I've never met RG sols but I have heard the same said about them form quite a few people.

[bonbon]

In the end I called my wife to the stand and two character references were read out by my barrister, nobody mentioned about having too many defence character witness statements and I took what RG said as gospel, I would look at it like the information is insignificant to the jury and they will switch off if you blabber on too much. I'm still unraveling all the poor legal advice I've been given by SG.

[Rights Fighter]

Exactly - too much blabber and they will switch off. SG?

[bonbon]

Sorry RG, wrong initials, still tired as my sleep pattern has not returned to normal yet, I was only found not guilty on Thursday.

[Rights Fighter]

I wasn't sure whether you meant SC or RG!

I don't blame you - it will be while before you settle down. Hold on in there.

[Justice4men]

...continued from previous post

Eventually, the legal aid agency gave in after several calls to them, and granted legal aid, asking for £13,776 worth of contributions, or £2,310 a month for the next 6 months, which is more than I get paid! I couldn't give a **** by this point, I was just glad it was granted.

The news just kept getting better, my solicitors had found a barrister, they said it wasn't their first choice but they would do their best to build a case in 6 days, not 6 working days, 6 straight days, this included Saturday and Sunday.

By this point I had used up all my holidays with work, and work still did not know what was going on because I learned from the last occasion to keep my mouth shut.

We attended a hearing which the judge set to go through my defence, and the judge blocked around 50% of my defence from being used for various different reasons, he was already annoyed with me and the impression I got was he just wanted to see me sent down.

My barrister, Lynne Shirley, didn't bite, she worked very hard day and night, often meeting me the next day with bloodshot eyes and a massive amount of work that even I could not have done in that time, I jokingly referred to her as robocop as she was amazing.

My defence wasn't great though, there were lots of things we couldn't do that we wanted to do because we had ran out of time, the only saving grace was that the prosecution didn't have much of a case either.

Lynne worked so hard, she made herself ill, she started to lose her voice and was looking physically drained, yet she stayed focused and inspired me to keep focused. My barrister offered me lots of advice and worked with me to help me give the best evidence I could when on the stand.

Lynne never stopped, she was relentless, she organised my witnesses at very short notice, and had my wife take to the stand which was at my wife's request, Lynne recommended against it but my wife wanted to give evidence, I should have taken Lynne's advice as my wife gave evidence which was not in my favour, but I was happy because she told the truth and that is all that mattered to me.

Lynne had a hard time with the judge too, he stopped us from asking my sister-in-law a lot of questions, giving us just 20 minutes to cross examine her.

At this point the best I hoped for was a hung jury.

Then the trial started, and the prosecution gave a good case to my surprise, but it was all based on lies. I took notes throughout the trial and so did my barrister, we pointed out, using photos from Facebook, where the prosecution had lied, and this ultimately won over the jury. The judge directed the jury to find me guilty as he read a very prosecution bias summary of the case.

The jury did not buy any of what the judge said. I was found not guilty on all 5 counts, 2 counts were specimen counts which the prosecution had added to try and ensure I was sent down. The jury took 3 hours to come to a unanimous verdict of not guilty, they accepted that my sister-in-law was lying, the photos alone proved this, and I'm now free to get on with my life again.

So never give up hoping, stay strong, and just keep trying. 6 days was enough time to build a defence for me, don't let anyone tell you otherwise. I beat all odds, and I'm here now to tell my story. I've learned a lot from my experience, and I'm here to support others who are going through the same.

My heart goes out to you dear brother! The universe will see to the individuals far more swiftly and harshly than what any could fathom!....that i can assure!