Law, Life and Laughter by Irvine Smith

Author:Irvine Smith
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781845023850
Publisher: Black & White Publishing
Published: 2011-09-24T00:00:00+00:00

13

THE SUMMARY TRIAL

Much Summary Court business can be described as ‘run of the mill’ – petty assaults, theft, housebreaking, breach of the peace, road traffic and statutory offences – appropriate to the limited powers of that court, and whose consequences tend to be of interest only to the parties involved.

Some summary trials, however, can raise substantial issues of facts of law. In Glasgow, the alleged careless omission of £2 million from company accounts was decided in a summary trial, and some of these trials have features which make them, and the memory of them, of interest to more than the participants and their families. Such are cases where the alleged crime is part of a set of circumstances which are unusual, involve nice questions of law, and reveal social habits and attitudes which the sociologist in most of us finds revealing and significant. Such cases are in a class of their own and where the bench forms a verdict in these cases it is, in my view, bound to set forth in some detail, preferably in writing, the reasons which brought it to the decision, which may result in economic or social ruin or both to an accused.

One such case I tried in 1972 was The Procurator Fiscal of Glasgow against Diack and Newlands.14 The charge against both accused was that they ‘did between 20 November and 8 December 1971, both dates inclusive, at 201 Pitt Street, Glasgow, occupied by Wylie Lochhead Limited (Funeral undertakers) or elsewhere steal a funeral casket’. The trial, which lasted six days, involved unusual questions of both fact and law, and its hearing and result proved to have much more than a transient interest. One enterprising sheriff made a recording from its circumstances which won an award in a legal education context in America.

The facts were unusual, if not unique. The trial was conducted by two of the most experienced, effective and distinguished pleaders of the Glasgow Bar of the day. The Crown was represented by the late Leonard Lovat, one of the senior and most experienced prosecutors in Glasgow, with a rich command of language, profound common sense, a thorough mastery of tactics and a sense of humour. The accused were represented by Ross Harper who shone equally in the Civil and the Criminal Courts. In the trial that followed, both gave of their experienced best and it was conducted with the utmost decorum.

It was one of the most fascinating cases in fact and law in which I was ever involved. My written reasons for the verdicts given at its conclusion may go some way to explain its fascination for those who pled it, and for myself. My judgment was in the following terms:

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