Following the dreadful, terrible killings and attacks in Nottingham last year, a series of reviews was announced after the sentencing of Valdo Calocane. There are many reviews ongoing in to policing and healthcare as well as prosecution and court decisions — the first of them has reported today, March 25th.
His Majesty’s Crown Prosecution Service Inspectorate has today published their report which finds significant problems in how communication with families and victims took place, but fundamentally states the CPS were correct to charge Calpcane with three murders and three attempted murders and then accept his pleas for manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility in lieu of the murder charges.
The matter point has been the big one and HMCPSI address that —
“To have continued with an evidentially weak case in the hope that a jury would have been willing to convict because of the horrific nature of the offender’s crimes, would have been wrong and not in accordance with the Code for Crown Prosecutors. The CPS and prosecution counsel considered the relevant law as to the acceptance of the pleas and applied it correctly.” (p8.)
The HMCPSI report is available to read and summaries with some families’ responses on the BBC News website.
WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?
I think this conclusion was inevitable given the law as it stands.
You’ll notice the report itself alludes to whether homicide offences are correctly structured and classified for the modern world, referring the Law Commission recommendations from almost twenty years ago that homicide offences be re-structured in to three tiers. Updates from Emma Webber, the mother of Barnaby Webber who was killed in the attacks, also refer to the inappropriate, out-of-date way in which the law is structured and all of this is entirely valid, of course.
Those are comments about the law as it should be, hence we’re seeing the discord of CPS having been found to have acted correctly in terms of their main responsibilities to charge and prosecute the case with the law as it stands and the families’ ongoing dissatisfaction with what has occurred.
None of this excuses the poor way in which families did not receive clear, timely communication about how events were unfolding as a trial began to loom large to at least help them understand what was coming and how the prosecutors were thinking ahead of the big decision about whether to proceed to trial for murder.
You can read more of the posts I did covering the incidents, sentencing and coverage elsewhere on the website and this is the first of several update posts we’ll see as the other reviews conclude in coming months.
NB: this is the latest in post about the terrible events in Nottingham, June 2023. You can find all the others collated on a specific Nottingham resources page along with other materials, inc reports and legal documents.
Winner of the President’s Medal, the Royal College of Psychiatrists.
Winner of the Mind Digital Media Award
All opinions expressed are my own – they do not represent the views of any organisation.
(c) Michael Brown, 2024
I try to keep this blog up to date, but inevitably over time, amendments to the law as well as court rulings and other findings from inquests and complaints processes mean it is difficult to ensure all the articles and pages remain current. Please ensure you check all legal issues in particular and take appropriate professional advice where necessary.
Government legislation website – www.legislation.gov.uk
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