Dawes & Ors v R.

The four appellants were convicted on 11 May 2005 of various drug related offences following a ten week trial before Judge Pert Q.C. and a jury in the Crown Court at Nottingham. John Dawes is 37 and is the son of Arthur Dawes aged 60. Rebecca Bridge aged 24 is Arthur Dawes partner. The remaining appellant, who is unrelated to the others, is Ryan Smith.

John Dawes and Ryan Smith, were each convicted of two conspiracies, one to supply class A drugs (diamorphine) and one to supply class B drugs (amphetamine). They were also convicted of a third conspiracy, namely to launder money. Arthur Dawes and Rebecca Bridge were likewise convicted of that third conspiracy. The sentences were as follows. John Dawes 24 years for the class A conspiracy with concurrent sentences of 12 and 10 years for the class B conspiracy and the money laundering conspiracy. Ryan Smith was sentenced to 14 years for the class A conspiracy with concurrent sentences of 8 and 5 years for the other conspiracies. Arthur Dawes received 8 years and Rebecca Bridge 4 years for the money laundering conspiracy.

Each of the appellants appeals against conviction by leave of the single judge. John Dawes, Ryan Smith and Arthur Dawes also appeal against sentence by leave of the single judge. Bridge’s appeal against sentence was heard and dismissed by the Full Court on the 31 July 2006.

The prosecutions arose out of a major police operation that began in 2001 and ended with the arrest of the appellants in September 2003. The indictment covered the period September 1997 to September 2003. In summary, John Dawes was said to be a key and dominant figure in an organisation involved in trade in heroin and amphetamine. Ryan Smith was said to be his trusted lieutenant. Arthur Dawes and Rebecca Bridge assisted in laundering the proceeds by allowing their home to be used to store money and take part in deliveries. Bridge was said to have acted as bookkeeper for the operation. Ledgers in her handwriting seized from their home showed receipts and outgoings.

The Crown’s case against the appellants can be summarised under a number of headings.

Unusually, there were no less than four witnesses who had been participants in the operation who gave evidence for the Crown. These were Richard Carrington, Marc Simpson, Lee Blackmore and Kristian Barsby.

Carrington worked for the Dawes family from 2000 until late 2001 or early 2002. He was a courier for John Dawes brother Robert, who was not a defendant at the trial but whom the Crown claimed had gone abroad and was heavily involved in the operation. Carrington was also involved with John Dawes and saw him operating an electric money counting machine at his house at Copperfields putting money into bundles of £1,000. In 2000 or 2001 he had gone to the Colwick unit that was used for making ecstasy tablets and ‘cutting’ cocaine and amphetamine. He went there mainly to pick up drugs or help move them. Drugs were put in John Dawes Shogun under a spare wheel in the rear of the vehicle. John Dawes claimed to have sold the Shogun in 1999. Carrington never saw Arthur Dawes dealing with drugs but saw him move them around. In cross-examination he agreed he had only seen Arthur Dawes once and that he had not mentioned it in his witness statements.

Carrington further said he had taken drugs to Rugby and Manchester and money to Holland and Spain for Robert and John Dawes, flying from Heathrow, East Midlands and Gatwick. The money was in shoes or the false lining of suit cases. Carrington had previous convictions and his credibility was vigorously attacked. He denied transposing people who had worked for Robert Dawes and saying they worked for John Dawes.

Marc Simpson likewise had a criminal record. When he was released from prison in January 2002 he met John Dawes and moved into Arthur Dawes’ house. In March 2002 he and a friend of his called Shane Smith agreed to sell heroin for John Dawes and that anything above £750 per ounce would be profit. A meeting took place at which John Dawes, Gary Hardy, Garth Blower and Shane Smith were present. John Dawes said Simpson could sell in Sutton and Blower in Kirkby-in-Ashfield. Simpson obtained names from Dawes. He always took the money to John Dawes, usually at his house but once at a public house. On two occasions he picked up 10 kilos of amphetamine and John Dawes told him where to drop them. On one occasion John Dawes hit him in the face with a cosh and on other occasions he assaulted him by hitting him with bats or punching him. When he was released from prison in 2003 he heard Dawes had been arrested and decided to make a witness statement. He retracted his statement but later retracted his retraction.

Lee Blackmore was released from prison in June 2000 and began selling heroin for himself. Then he worked for a short period for Paul Day before John Dawes told him he would have to work for him. Simpson came over a week later and told him Dawes had sent him. John Dawes never sold him drugs directly. Simpson brought him 7 ounces a week which he divided into half gram bags. He paid Simpson. He collected heroin with Simpson from Matlock on eight or ten occasions. After a while Barsby replaced Simpson and supplied Blackmore. A lot of the time Barsby was with Ryan Smith. He passed money to Barsby either in the car or house in the presence of Ryan Smith. John Dawes came to Blackmore’s house looking for Simpson and told Blackmore to “pull his finger out.”

Blackmore said Barsby became stressed after a load of heroin went missing. Ryan Smith came to collect the money that he, Blackmore owed. He was stressed by debt and could not stop, although he wanted to. He stopped after Barsby went missing. The police approached him and said Barsby had come in and admitted everything. Asked if the police wanted him to give evidence against John Dawes, he said he had been given an opportunity to come clean and change his life.

Kristian Barsby’s evidence implicated John Dawes and Ryan Smith in Counts 1 and 2. He said that John Dawes was at the top of the chain. Ryan Smith was his assistant and gave instructions to Barsby. Smith was involved in runs to collect heroin and amphetamine. Barsby himself collected the money and gave it to Smith for him to give to John Dawes. Smith and Barsby split the profits on each ounce. Barsby’s first witness statement had not implicated Smith and we shall return to this in due course.

Barsby was 24 years old at the time of the trial. He had “knocked about” with Ryan Smith and had been friendly with him for three years. He lived in the same road as John Dawes and got to know him through Ryan Smith. Eventually he visited Dawes on a daily basis either alone or with Smith. He said that he began to work for Dawes. Smith had owed Dawes money and was paying it back in instalments. Dawes provided him with a car for several hundred pounds which he had paid back. He described Dawes as having wedges of money wrapped in rubber bands in £1,000 blocks. The main amounts were in £20 notes. Eventually Barsby owed £1,300 for a car and a scooter. He had to pay interest and agreed that £50 per week was about right. He also said that Dawes bought mobile phones for him and Ryan Smith to use. This was denied by Dawes. He said that he ended up working for John Dawes through Ryan Smith to settle his debt. The work involved him carrying heroin and amphetamine from one place to another. Smith had not been present when Dawes told him that the work involved drugs.

His first job had been to pick up a kilo of heroin from a Tesco car park near Newark Way in Nottingham and deliver it. He delivered it to a public house. John Dawes would use the word “one” to describe a kilo. He said he could not remember any code words used during mobile phone conversations although his statement referred to a number of code terms. He also said that drugs were buried and that this idea came from Dawes. Neither, Dawes nor Ryan Smith used drugs. Initially Ryan Smith had accompanied Barsby but eventually Smith just acted as his director.

Barsby took heroin to Lee Blackmore to divide it into ounces. He thought he supplied two or three people daily and collected heroin from the Tesco car park perhaps once a month. His share of the profit was £75 per ounce. Ryan Smith also received £75. He said he also collected amphetamine from the same place in Nottingham, the smallest quantity being 2 to 4 kilos and the largest 20 kilos. He delivered it to the same public house and also to Matlock. He gave money to John Dawes rather than Ryan Smith on more than one occasion. In Copperfields the money was kept in a jar or drawer and John Dawes made notes on a piece of paper using a gate system of four horizontal lines and a vertical line to denote five. Barsby said he had £3,000 to £4,000 in his possession at one time from drugs.

He said Dawes asked him to take money to Amsterdam. He was given the money by Ryan Smith en route to East Midlands Airport on 15 July 2002. Janet Yemm was also there. He thought there was about £20,000. He put the money in the sleeves of his coat and trainers. Smith paid for all the flights. The Customs and Excise stopped him and had taken about £2,000 from him but did not search him and he went back with the bulk of the money. He had lied when questioned by Customs and Excise.

Barsby also said that he went to Kirkby to make a delivery and dealt with Garth Blower. He delivered heroin and testers. He delivered amphetamine to Paul Hardy, a relative of Gary Hardy. His take was a few cars and the paying off of a loan. Barsby said that he told people he was going to stop. He said word had got back to John Dawes because stashes of heroin began to go missing. Dawes told Barsby that he had to pay everything back, at least £10,000. Barsby said he was afraid of being beaten or worse. Barsby denied that he had gone to Ryan Smith’s girlfriend Emily when the second stash went missing. He agreed Smith had provided him with a car the day before he went to the police but said that this was to pick up drugs and nothing more. Asked about a mobile phone he said it contained names of the persons he dealt to. The phone also contained a number for “J” and the text: “Am I getting some cash today?” That was on the same phone on which John Dawes called DC Phillips in October 2002. The October 2002 phone call is the subject of a specific ground of appeal to which we shall return shortly.

Barsby knew Robert Dawes was involved in drug dealing and said that he was in charge and lived in Spain. He denied the suggestion that he had described a true situation but had substituted the name of John Dawes for someone else. He could not explain why his statements made no mention of Ryan Smith being Dawes right hand man. He agreed that he had made £30,000 over six months for supplying heroin and that this was aggravated by the supply of amphetamine, and that he could expect a lengthy custodial sentence. He could not account for references to Ryan Smith and himself replacing Shane Smith in the chain of supply appearing only in his later statements.

Barsby’s father gave evidence that he saw Ryan Smith with two rolls of money that must have contained over £2,000.

It was the Crown’s case against John Dawes that he and his wife Helen, who faced a separate trial, could not have enjoyed the lifestyle they did on the available income. Prior to 1 September 1997 they had lived at 10 Pepper Street in Sutton-in-Ashfield. Helen Dawes had claimed housing benefit from that address since 1991. Between October 1989 and June 1995 John Dawes claimed housing and council tax benefit at that address. From July 1995 to July 1999 he claimed income support from 51 Jepson Road, Sutton in Ashfield. Revenue and National Insurance records showed him working for three months in 1999 and earning just under £2,000. In September 1997 he won the same amount in the National Lottery. From June 1995 to October 1999 Helen Dawes claimed income support. She had worked as a barmaid since April 2002.

Between November 1998 and October 1999 they purchased 10 Pepper Street under the right to buy scheme for £15,000. In his evidence John Dawes said that he had managed to raise £18,000, £12,000 of which came from the sale of a caravan in September 1999. £10,000 came from Neil Dallison.

On 12 July 2000 they purchased Copperfields in Tudor Street, Sutton in Ashfield for about £38,000 from John Roebuck, an uncle by marriage. They also carried out a lot of work on the property. In addition John Dawes rented an apartment in Spain for 11 months in 2001.

Searches by the police of Pepper Street in 2001 and Copperfields in 2003 revealed a stack of envelopes but there was little in the way of business records. John Dawes said in interview that he did not keep records. The only records before the jury covered a period of about 5 weeks in 2003.

At the time of their arrest they had four credit cards, seven store card accounts and five bank accounts. Between 1997 and 2003 they deposited £171,590 into these accounts. Over the same period they withdrew £167,000 and made purchases on the credit cards totalling £94,000.

James Davies had been selling a caravan site that he owned in Ingoldmells in late 2002 for £130,000. John Dawes had been interested in purchasing it and wanted Davies to consider taking a bungalow in Ingoldmells in part exchange. The only bungalow in Ingoldmells referred to in the evidence was 5, Central Avenue, the address of Rebecca Bridge.

When he was arrested in May 2003 John Dawes was found to be in possession of £14,000 in cash that he had received from Gary Hardy. He declined to explain to the police why the money had been transferred to him. In an interview in September he told the police that it was a loan and that its purpose was to purchase a caravan but declined to state where the money had come from. The interviewing officer told him that he believed the money came from the proceeds of sale of class A drugs and asked him to account for it but he declined to do so.

A number of vehicles were also found at the Copperfields address. In evidence the appellant said that most, if not all, belong to other people.

Arthur Dawes had been living at 59 Taylor Crescent, Sutton in Ashfield. He received income support at that address between November 1998 and January 1999. Between 16 September 1997 and the date of his arrest he was in receipt of incapacity benefit. Records showed only one period of employment in 2000 for which he earned about £1,000.

Rebecca Bridge had not worked during the period specified in the indictment and was in receipt of income support for long periods.

On 1 June 2001 the police raided the Colwick unit (to which, as we have mentioned, Carrington referred in his evidence) and recovered £1½ million worth of heroin paracetamol, cannabis and amphetamine. They arrested Jonathan Guest and Martin Smith. Smith’s phone numbers appeared in Guest’s phone book as did a number for J.D. – 856574. John Dawes was present in court at the trial of Martin Smith in October 2002. Butler and Guest were said by Barsby to be employees of John Dawes. Butler was arrested on 10 June near Jepson Road and found to be in possession of one kilo of heroin. Butler also had a map that he had obtained from Guest in prison which showed the location of underground stashes of heroin in Sutton Woods. He was also in possession of a document that appeared to be list of code words. On a separate piece of paper he had a list of telephone numbers including Sara Dawes, Helen Dawes, “Eddie” (Arthur Dawes was known as Eddie) and “Jade” with the number 455143, the last number called before the police seized the phone.

We have referred already to Barsby’s evidence that John Dawes asked him to take money to Amsterdam. Customs officers stopped Barsby, Smith and Janet Yemm at East Midlands Airport on 15 July 2002. Smith had £3,000 on him, which he said he might need to buy a car. Barsby first said he was travelling alone to Amsterdam and was unsure for how long. Then he said he was travelling with Smith. He had £1,000 but no bags. He denied travelling with Yemm. He knew her, but it was a coincidence they were on the same flight. Yemm said she was going to Amsterdam to buy property. She said she had £800 on her but when searched there was £18,000 in her bag which she said was savings. £14,000 of the money had been made into bundles at the National Westminster Bank, Sutton-in-Ashfield on 15, 16 and 17 January 2002. John Dawes had drawn £20,000 from his joint bank account on 18 January 2002. Barsby, Smith and Yemm had consecutively numbered flight tickets. No proceedings were taken at the time against Barsby, Smith or Yemm but the money was confiscated.

On 16 August 2002 DC Wallis saw Ryan Smith driving a vehicle in which Barsby was passenger. On 19 August 2002 DC Wallis saw Smith driving a red Sierra registered to Paul Bower. The following day he was seen driving the same Sierra with John Dawes in the front seat and Barsby in the rear. On 1 September 2002 DC Wallis spoke to Barsby in the garden at Copperfields. The Sierra was parked outside. Ryan Smith arrived on a yellow Suzuki. John Dawes arrived on a brown Suzuki and sped off, being away a few minutes before returning. On 10 September 2002 DC Wallis saw John Dawes, Ryan Smith and Barsby outside Copperfields. On 16 September 2002 Barsby was seen driving a Renault. A few minutes later the vehicle was parked outside Copperfields.

On 23 May 2003 the police saw Gary Hardy driving a black Porsche. The Crown’s case was that it paused at a junction, long enough to give the impression that it was waiting there, before pulling round the corner. The police then saw John Dawes at the passenger door. He got into the vehicle. Police saw body movement in the vehicle as if something was being handed over and decided to search them. John Dawes was on the pavement with a carrier bag and the Porsche drove off. Dawes then got into a vehicle that was driven by Paul Bower. The carrier bag contained £14,000. The officers asked what had been exchanged and Dawes replied that he had just got £14,000 from Gary. This is the £14,000 that we have referred to in paragraph 26.

A diary entry for 7 June 2003 contained the entry “100,000 smoke”. At 5.30 p.m. On that day Arthur Dawes drove his VW Passat to the M1 services at Newport Pagnell. There was a woman in the vehicle. The Crown alleged that this was Rebecca Bridge, but she was not identified at an identification parade held 18 months later. Just under £100,000 was transferred to a London Taxi Cab which was followed and stopped on the M1. The Passat arrived back at Skegness at 7.48 pm. Arthur Dawes and Rebecca Bridge were in the vehicle. In the boot was shopping in Morrison’s supermarket bags.

D.C. Phillips was appointed as a liaison officer for John Dawes after the murder of a man called David Draycott, because some people believed that he might have had some involvement. John Dawes had DC Phillips’ mobile telephone number. DC Phillip’s evidence was that John Dawes phoned him at 7.30 pm on 23 June 2003 because he could not locate his son Paul Dawes who had been taken into police custody and then been placed in care. There had been an earlier incident on 12 June when Paul Dawes had ended up practically naked in Mansfield. During the conversation John Dawes asked DC Phillips when he was due to retire and offered him work saying they were always on the look out for lads like him, cops coming up to retirement. DC Phillips was also told that with the information that he could provide he would “shoot up the promotion ladder in their organisation.” DC Phillips said that he made a note of the conversation on his home computer within minutes and did not accept that he might have misunderstood it. John Dawes was not shown the note at interview because the only copy was on his home computer and DC Phillips was on holiday.

At 5 Central Avenue, the address of Rebecca Bridge, the police found two bank note counting machines. A Dutch mobile phone was also found in a bedside cabinet. In the utility room was a holdall with two maps one of Barcelona and one of Santander with hotels marked in rings. In a sideboard cupboard in the living room was a 2003 diary. There were entries “in” and “out” for the period from February to 12 June and references to names, places and flights. Also in the cupboard were a number of handwritten lists containing apparent references to names and places. Some pages appeared to contain material relating to named individuals including “Eddie”.

Also in the lounge were a large number of receipts for mobile phone cards, 10 phone chargers and a number of other items. Amongst the items in Rebecca Bridge’s handbag was a book containing a number of phone numbers in a mixture of Rebecca Bridge’s and Arthur Dawes’ handwriting.

Inside the sideboard was a tray under which was a piece of wood containing a false bottom. Inside was a phonebook; the first entry was written in Arthur Dawes’ handwriting. The other entries were written by Rebecca Bridge, according to Arthur Dawes on his instructions the numbers having come from Tony Handley. The names correlated with those in the diary and other documents relating to the “ins” and “outs.” One number ending in 192 appeared next to J. A vodaphone top up card ending in 150 had frequent contact with the 192 number in April 2003. In his evidence Arthur Dawes said that he possibly used the 150 number but subsequently said that he did not recognise the number. At one stage it was suggested to John Dawes on behalf of Arthur Dawes that calls made between the 192 and the 150 phones on 2 April were between John Dawes and Arthur Dawes whereas John Dawes’ evidence was that the phone was in the possession of Paul Bower on that date. From a shed in the garden was retrieved an envelope containing further documents with names, again said by Arthur Dawes to have come from Handley. The Crown’s case was that the J who appeared against the 192 number in the records was John Dawes and that he was also J referred to in the “ins” and “outs” entries in the other documentation. It was suggested that the 192 phone could be linked to him by correlating usage of the phone, the site location, the times calls were made and calls between it and the 150 number on 2 April, a day on which Paul Dawes arrived in the United Kingdom at Luton Airport.

There was no dispute that John Dawes had taxed a Range Rover at the vehicle licensing centre on the morning of 4 April 2003. At 10.07 he was observed using a mobile phone in the same vehicle. The Crown’s case was that the cell site analysis of the calls revealed the movements of the 192 phone which, when correlated with police observations of John Dawes showed that he was the person using the 192 phone. John Dawes did not dispute possession of the 192 phone between 7 and 20 April. Various calls between the 192 and 681 phones prior to 19 April were dealt with by way of admissions. On 19 April there were repeated calls between the two phones and John Dawes accepted he was using the 192 phone to call Ryan Smith on the 681 phone. He also said Ryan Smith sold that phone to Shane Smith but he did not know the date on which it changed hands.

On 29 April 2003 Steven Hutchinson crashed a car containing 2 kilos of heroin. Also in the car was the 681 phone. In its memory against the 192 phone was the name ‘Don’. On 28 and 29 April there had been 28 calls between 192 and 681 up until the moment of Hutchinson’s arrest and seizure of the phone. Much has been made on this appeal to linking of ‘Don’ to the 192 phone, the argument being that this indicates ‘J’ in the ledger entries is not to be read as referring to John Dawes. We shall return to this when we come to deal with the appeal of John Dawes.

The Crown alleged that bank notes seized from East Midlands Airport, Newport Pagnell and Central Avenue, Skegness were contaminated with a degree of heroin not seen in notes in general circulation. The defence claimed there was inadequate evidence to establish this and the point seems to have been regarded as of little relevance by the judge.

The Crown produced a schedule showing a number of flights from January 2000 by some of the appellants and other named individuals. The Crown’s case was that the schedule was important both for showing the costs incurred and the purpose behind the flights.

Ryan Smith declined to answer any questions. John Dawes denied any dealings with drugs or other drug dealers or laundering the proceeds of drugs. He also denied sending large amounts of cash abroad. He denied giving over £22,000 to Ryan Smith to take to Amsterdam via East Midlands Airport. He declined to talk about his relationship with Ryan Smith and a number of others. He gave his occupation as builder and said he did double glazing, patios and conservatories earning an average about a £1,000 to £1,500 per week. He declined to say where he worked but indicated that he could produce those for whom he worked as witnesses. He declined to provide a list of customers. He said he was paid by cash or cheque. The latter were paid into bank accounts. He wrote what people owed him on the back of a calendar. He named four businesses that he ran. He said that the £14,000 that was in his possession in May 2003 (the Gary Hardy £14,000) belonged to him. He declined to acknowledge that Gary Hardy was the person who had given it to him, or the purpose apart from implying that it was to do with his business Apex Construction. He said it had been intended to pay a multi-national company but declined to state the purpose. Subsequently he said it was to pay for a caravan. The interviewing officer told John Dawes that he believed the £14,000 was the proceeds of dealing in class A drugs and invited him to account for it but he declined to do so. He said he had little to do with Arthur Dawes and that Arthur Dawes was not involved in any of his ventures. He travelled abroad because he liked to have as many holidays as possible. He denied knowing where his brother Robert Dawes lived and did not know if he lived in Spain. Initially he denied knowing anyone called Marc Simpson. He also initially declined to answer questions about the £20,000 seized at East Midlands Airport but later said it had nothing to do with him. He denied giving Smith, Barsby or Yemm money to take out of the country. He declined to answer questions about money owed to him by Barsby and denied that Barsby had worked for him in any capacity. Later he said that Barsby was a liar and owed him £2,000 and a Vauxhall Nova. He denied sending him to Liverpool to collect a vehicle.

Arthur Dawes declined to answer most of the questions but did say that the £10,000 hidden at 5 Central Avenue belonged to him and was being kept for a rainy day. He had received some insurance money following the death of his wife in the early 1990’s and had a few endowment policies. His only income was weekly benefit of £85. Since he had a bank account containing £6,000 he was asked to explain the need to keep £10,000 in cash on the premises. He said it was more convenient. It represented savings from when he was in work. However, he had finished work in 1997 and none of the notes had been printed and were in circulation at that time. He also said that the handwriting in the ledgers and the diary found at his home had nothing to do with him. He had a home at 59 Taylor Crescent, in Sutton paid for by the council. His partner, Rebecca Bridge rented the address at 5 Central Avenue. He declined to answer any questions about the observations at Newport Pagnell, and various other matters, including the role of Tony Handley who later became central to his defence.

Rebecca Bridge said that Arthur Dawes had bought the money counters that the police found. She denied storing property at her home for anyone else or that the money counters had been used since they had been at her home. Arthur Dawes had told her to hide the £10,000. She declined to comment on whether any of the handwriting in the ledgers was hers. She did not know any of the persons named in the book. The records of telephone numbers belonged to Arthur Dawes although she accepted that they contained her handwriting also. She declined to answer questions about Newport Pagnell although she confirmed that Arthur Dawes had once driven a silver VW Passat. She said that she had nothing to do with either John Dawes or Robert Dawes.

At the trial neither Ryan Smith nor Rebecca Bridge gave evidence. John Dawes did give evidence. His previous convictions, which were not drug related, went in because he had attacked the character of prosecution witnesses.

His evidence was that he did not get on well with his brother and did not know what he did for a living in Spain. He did agree to do some work for him. He believed he had been “tarred with what his brother had done.” His brother had threatened to shoot both the appellant himself and his wife. He also said he did not get on with his father and had had nothing to do with Rebecca Bridge. He accepted that he knew a lot of people who were drug dealers. He denied being aware of Richard Carrington and had never seen him before. Carrington could never have visited Copperfields because it was not habitable until Christmas 2001.

He said that Marc Simpson was a friend of Shane Smith. He had given him some old clothes and agreed to let him stay at Arthur Dawes house. They had fallen out and Simpson kept out of his way. He denied ever going to the house of either Blackmore or his girlfriend. His only contact with Blackmore had been as a babysitter for him and he had not seen him for a long time. He agreed that he had gone to Derby with Ryan Smith and Barsby to collect a vehicle. He further agreed that Barsby visited his home with Ryan Smith but could not remember him visiting alone. He said that the money seized at East Midlands’ Airport on 15 July 2002 had gone from his account to Sarah Dawes. He agreed that he had told the police in interview he owed the money to Rob. He did not tell the police he gave it to Sarah because they did not ask. He said that the money received from Gary Hardy on 23 May 2003 was a loan in order to help secure more work with Apex Windows using the argument that the earnings could be used to pay the loan back.

He did not recall the conversation with DC Phillips in which he offered him employment. It might have been the offer of a job in a building firm although he did not know if DC Phillips had any particular skill in the building trade.

In respect of the 192 number he said that he had bought the phone from Bower but said that Bower had had the phone on 2 April and had collected Paul Dawes from Luton. He did not accept the suggestion made on behalf of Arthur Dawes that calls between the 192 and 150 numbers on 2 April had been between himself and Arthur Dawes. He had sold the 192 phone to Hutchinson before 29 April.

He accepted that he had made many flights abroad but explained them as cigarette trips, setting up his apartment or holidays.

Arthur Dawes gave evidence that he too had previous convictions that were not drug related. He bought and sold cars and caravans and had smuggled cigarettes. He did not think that Robert Dawes was involved in drugs. He believed his reason for leaving England in June 2001 was that he had had trouble with some people in Middlesbrough. He had visited him several times in Spain where he was obviously a successful businessman. He had two bars and a business supplying bars and restaurants. He sought to distance himself from the money counting machines that were found at his address. He agreed that he had been at Newport Pagnell but said that the woman accompanying him was someone whom Tony Handley had asked him to meet in a lay by at Northampton and to drive to Newport Pagnell. He was to receive £500. He returned to Skegness where he picked up Rebecca Bridge who had been doing some shopping. He agreed that he had changed his defence well into the trial. He had intended to deny being at Newport Pagnell and having anything to do with the ledgers or the phones that had anything to do with criminal activity and that he had not bothered to look at the ledgers.

The main thrust of John Dawes’ appeal against conviction was that his case at trial was that he was not responsible for any drug distribution or dealing. The four accomplices who had given evidence had substituted his name for others. He had been targeted in error. The police had shut their eyes to the truth. He was not the “J” referred to in the ledgers, albeit Arthur Dawes referred to him as “J” and this was how he was known in the family. At the trial he was unable to suggest another candidate for “J” in the ledgers but this would have not been the case had the Crown fulfilled its disclosure obligations. He was hamstrung to explain “J” in the ledgers and make a case that the 192 phone was not in his possession on 29 April 2003.

The fundamental difficulty for John Dawes seems to us to be this. Mr Roderick Johnson Q.C., who appeared for John Dawes before us but did not appear at the trial, submitted that “J” in the ledger was the vital evidence against his client apart from the evidence of the four accomplices. But the defence statement never took the point that he was not “J”. Disclosure cannot be viewed as simply a one way process. The defence cannot justifiably complain about inadequate disclosure if at the same time they are not open in making clear what matters are really in issue. We have seen no evidence whatever of any deliberate misleading on the part of the prosecution in relation to disclosure and consequently if, and in so far as, there has been any failure of disclosure, it is of no assistance to the contention that the accomplices were manipulated into implicating John Dawes, as to which there is in any event no evidence.

The one area of prosecution disclosure that we think may have been deficient relates to primary disclosure. It is one thing not to name others involved in the conspiracy on the indictment, but another not to disclose their existence. We think this may apply to events of 29 April 2003. The fact, however, that others may have been involved or interlinked in the drug dealing, does not of itself begin to exculpate John Dawes unless the diary entries related to a “J” that was not him. In our view such a contention was fanciful and never a realistic defence argument. Nothing we have heard or seen on this appeal suggests that such a contention would ever have been realistically viable.

As we have mentioned, when on 29 April 2003 Steven Hutchinson crashed the car containing 2 kilos of heroin and the 681 phone, the phone contained within its memory against the 192 phone the name “Don.” On 28 and 29 April there had been 28 calls between 192 and 681 up to the moment of Hutchinson’s arrest and seizure of the phone. The position as we understand it is this. The information now available enables the defence to argue that the Hutchinson transaction was orchestrated from the seller end by Sean Judge and Judge’s associate J Quinn (“Don”). “J” could be J Quinn cooperating with Sean Judge and this, so it is said, could have been the key to unravelling the whole case. However, on John Dawes’ evidence, he admits possession of the 192 phone earlier in the month.

Whilst it is true that on the basis of all the material we now have there is a somewhat complex factual jungle as regards telephones and individuals the events of 29 April were but a single incident in a case involving many events over a long period of time. Any evidence relating to “J”, however viewed, has no direct bearing on the evidence of the four accomplices each of whom implicated John Dawes in the conspiracies. The Crown accepts that they are open to some criticism about disclosure but the plain fact is that overall the evidence against John Dawes was overwhelming, whoever supplied the drugs to Hutchinson. Even supposing the jury could not be sure the 192 phone was being used by John Dawes rather than Quinn on 29 April, Quinn was using it as Don (because that was the reference to it on the 681 phone). The significant point is that this aspect of the case has no direct relevance to the evidence of the accomplices which is in no way undermined.

Finally, any criticism of the Crown’s disclosure has to be considered against the fact that the Crown in reality knew nothing of John Dawes case until his evidence in chief.

Although Mr Johnson did not expand in oral argument on any of the other grounds of appeal he did not abandon any of them. He helpfully submitted that they were adequately covered in the original counsel’s grounds of appeal. The first point was that the judge should not have admitted the evidence of the disputed conversation between John Dawes and DC Phillips on the ground that there was a breach of Code C of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 in that the contents of the conversation should have been put John Dawes at the first reasonable opportunity. Further, he should have been cautioned and given an opportunity in a taped interview to give his account of what had been said. We reject both of these contentions. The evidence in our view was of sufficiently probative value to warrant its admission and there was no unfairness to Dawes in admitting it.

Next it is said that the judge summed up the case on the evidence of finances in a way that was inconsistent with how the case was put by the Crown. True, the Crown was unable to point to sums in the possession of John Dawes that were consistent with conspiracies on the scale alleged. But his lifestyle was completely inconsistent with such income as was identifiable as coming from non-drug related sources. Further, the Crown’s case was that most of the money was being laundered and moved around the country and smuggled abroad to the likes of Robert Dawes and others. His apparent indebtedness to the bank and credit card companies did not prevent him from acquiring expensive motor bikes, personalised number plates, maintaining a villa in Spain and living there on and off for significant periods of time as well as making other trips abroad when he claimed to be working as hard as he could at home to keep his head above water as a builder. We do not think there was anything inconsistent with the Crown’s case in the way in which the judge summed up.

Finally, as to the overall fairness of the summing up, whilst other judges might have summed up the case differently, we have been provided with a transcript of leading counsel, Mr Whitehouse Q.C.’s closing speech which was of disproportionate length lasting from late on the morning of 4 May until mid-morning on 6 May. It was necessary for the judge to put many of counsel’s submissions in their proper context and so that the jury could focus on the real issues in the case. There was in truth a very strong case against John Dawes and we are not persuaded that his conviction is unsafe. When dealing with the appeal of Ryan Smith we explore in some detail the judge’s failure to give a warning about the accomplice evidence. The evidence against John Dawes was of 4 accomplices not one and overall the case against him was much stronger than against Smith. Consequently any failure to give an accomplice warning does not threaten the safety of John Dawes’ conviction.

Ryan Smith’s main ground of appeal is that the judge failed to direct the jury appropriately as to their approach to the evidence of Barsby. Mr Hurst, who has appeared for Smith, submits that without the evidence of Barsby there was insufficient evidence to leave to the jury on the two drug conspiracy counts. The only other evidence against him related to the cash smuggling through East Midlands Airport (which went to the money laundering conspiracy) and marginal evidence of his involvement given by Blackmore. Ryan Smith did not give evidence.

At the beginning of his summing up the judge referred to the defence contention that the four witnesses Carrington, Simpson, Blackmore and Barsby might have interests of their own to serve in giving evidence. He said at p10A:

“If the prosecution in this case is right, John Dawes is a senior figure in what we might call an organised crime gang or syndicate and is somebody that people are genuinely afraid of. Ryan Smith is his trusted assistant, Arthur Dawes and Rebecca Bridge are the bookkeepers and either are the bag carriers or organise the bag carriers for vast amounts of cash. Membership of such an organisation, you may think, is limited to people who are trusted. If that were the true position, it would be extraordinarily difficult for the police to prove what is going on. You know that this police operation ran from 2001 until the arrests in September 2003. The police could maintain observations and they did – and you have heard the evidence of observation, I shall remind you of it in due course – but that is nothing like as good as having a first hand account from inside the organisation. It would probably be impossible to infiltrate an undercover police officer into such an organisation, so it would only be natural for the police to welcome somebody from inside who was prepared to talk. The sort of person who is recruited to such an organisation may well have a number of criminal convictions. Such a person, by being involved in the organisation, is almost certain to have committed further serious criminal offences. If he tells the police what has been going on, he will expose his own wrong doing. What causes such a person to speak to the police may vary: it may be fear, as Barsby claims, it may be conscience, it may be persuasion by police officers.

When such a witness does go to the police, he may have a variety of motives, one of which may be to get a lesser sentence for the serious offences that he himself has committed. Of course, there is nothing wrong in police officers seeking to reassure someone who is contemplating breaking ranks and giving evidence for the prosecution. There is nothing wrong, indeed it is their duty, for police officers to offer such people in appropriate situations the opportunity of the witness protection programme with a new life, a new identity in a different area and assistance in setting up that new life. The suggestion has been made in this case that police officers have gone beyond that and have misbehaved in handling those witnesses, either in enticing them to give evidence or in rewarding them whilst they were under police protection.

First, you have got to consider the realities of life under a witness protection programme. You have heard about sums of cash. We know that, in large measure, it is for the settlement of hotel bills for either the witnesses or police officers or both. How attractive does a life like that sound to you?

Secondly, the purpose of this trial is to try these defendants, not the police officers. We are not here to regulate their conduct or to punish them for any transgressions. You have to look at the evidence given by each of these witnesses.

It has been suggested that police officers have manoeuvred these four witnesses into giving the accounts they have given. You have to consider whether there is any evidence that gives support to such a suggestion.”

And then at 12G:

“You have to look to see whether there is any evidence at all that satisfies you that these witnesses have been manoeuvred into the position they have adopted.”

The judge then concluded at 14H:

“So what matters so far as these four witnesses are concerned is this. You must look at the evidence of each of them separately. If you were to conclude that any part of the evidence given by the one you are then considering was so tainted, either by police malpractice or by an expectation on the part of the witness of leniency, that the evidence itself is incapable of belief, then you must disregard that evidence.”

It was not argued by the Crown that there was a case against Ryan Smith absent the evidence to Barsby.

Mr Hurst submits that the jury should have been warned that there was a special need for caution in accepting the evidence of Barsby against Ryan Smith and that it was dangerous to act on his evidence alone. We were referred to R v Makanjuola [1995] 1WLR 1348, 1351D. It is true that the Lord Chief Justice in Makanjuola made it clear that there is no longer any requirement on the judge to give a warning about corroboration. It is in the judge’s discretion to decide whether any direction is necessary on the particular facts of the case. Our attention was also drawn to the observations of Longmore L.J. in R v Hunter and others [2002] EWCA (Crim) 2693 at para 28 where he said:

“When, however, an accomplice gives evidence for the Crown, it will in our view, usually be necessary to give a specific warning about the care with which the jury should approach his evidence.”

Mr Hurst’s argument is that it was unreasonable in the Wednesbury sense for the judge not to have given a warning in the present case. Nowhere, he submits, was there a hint of warning or caution in the summing up. If anything the passage we have read suggests the judge was explaining to the jury why they could accept the evidence of Barsby; it was the reverse of a warning.

The judge came to deal with Barsby’s evidence at p83 onwards. It is necessary to look at the history of Barsby’s witness statements.

Barbsy was the first of the four accomplices to go to the police. He did so on 26 November 2002. He spoke to the police for an hour, but unfortunately the notes of his conversation have been lost. He made witness statements on 27/11/2002, 29/11/2002, 1/12/2002, 3/1/2003, 13/3/2003 and 9/11/2003. In his first witness statement he gave a detailed account of his involvement in drug supply and mentioned Smith many times, but said nothing about Smith being involved in a conspiracy to supply drugs. In his second statement he gave further information about the conspiracies to supply drugs but did not implicate Smith. In his third statement he mentioned that he had ridden as a pillion passenger on John Dawes motor cycle driven by Smith when they went to collect some amphetamine. He went on to give a lot of other detail about the activities of others in conspiracies to supply drugs but did not include Smith. In his fourth statement Smith was again mentioned but not implicated in any drug conspiracy.

Finally, several months later in March 2003, when he had been under police protection for some 3½ months, he said the following which the judge recited to the jury at 102B:

“I have mentioned on page 2 of my initial statement Ryan Smith. Ryan Smith was the person who initially had all of the directives from John Dawes. Whenever Ryan was involved in the movement of controlled drugs, it was with the full knowledge and awareness of what he was doing. The business was being controlled from John Dawes through a youth called Shane Smith. Shane Smith had had enough of being involved in running drugs around for John Dawes and backed out. It was at this point that John Dawes became more and more, friendly with Ryan Smith and myself.”

We have seen the further statement of Barsby made on 9 November 2003 in which there is limited reference to Smith, the only matter of any possible significance at all being that Barsby was given a phone and SIM card by John Dawes when Barsby was in a car with Smith in Kirkby-in-Ashfield. Dawes said it had been used for “work” which Barsby took to mean drug dealing. Barsby did not however refer to this in his evidence and was not cross-examined about it. It does not, therefore, advance the Crown’s case against Smith.

When Barsby came to give evidence he was not given a prior opportunity to remind himself of what he had said in his witness statements. This, it is said on Smith’s behalf, was surprising bearing in mind the prosecution had been specifically asked that he should be shown them. Be that as it may, he gave a very different and much more detailed account of Smith’s involvement in the drug conspiracies than he had given in any of his witness statements. On the other hand his evidence about John Dawes remained broadly consistent.

The evidence he gave against Smith can be summarised as follows:

Barbsy was cross-examined and his original statement was put to him on a virtually line by line basis. He could not account for the differences but accepted he had gone to the police immediately after he stopped dealing when the events were fresh in his mind. He said he went to the police as a matter of conscience and he had gone intending to tell the whole truth.

The judge suggested in summing up at 84D that Barsby had given two versions and raised the possibility that the police were so concentrating their inquiries on John Dawes that Smith was left out when he should have been included. Then he said:

“Or did the witness statement originally taken by the police accurately set out the position and has Kristian Barsby now distorted the balance by implicating Ryan Smith more than he actually was involved? You have to judge whether the differences – and he agrees that there are differences – are explicable in that or any other acceptable way or do they indicate that he has deliberately lied or is otherwise unreliable.”

The basis for the judge’s suggestion was no more than that when cross-examined Barsby agreed that when he went to the police they were interested in John Dawes. Neither he nor the police proffered it as an explanation for the omission of Smith’s alleged criminal activity from Barsby’s witness statements.

Smith neither answered questions in interview nor gave evidence at the trial. His defence was that Barsby was lying about his role in the drug conspiracies and the other evidence in the case went at most to involvement in money laundering. Some evidence was read in the form of admissions and witness statements to the effect that he was a dealer in cars, scrap and telephones at the time of his alleged involvement in the offences. The judge gave the jury appropriate directions about Smith’s failure to answer questions in interview and to give evidence and pointed out he had put a positive case about the trip to East Midlands Airport on which the adverse inference might bite. He also mentioned that it was not in issue that he was a dealer in cars, scrap metal and telephones. But he did not remind the jury that his defence, albeit not advanced in evidence, was that Barsby’s evidence was untrue, albeit this must have been obvious to the jury.

The prosecution’s response is that albeit the judge did not expressly tell the jury to approach Barsby’s evidence with caution, the warning was there nonetheless, given the detail in which the judge dealt with his cross-examination. Following retirement the jury sent a note asking whether there were any statements or interview summaries by Ryan Smith. The judge told them, correctly that there were not. The prosecution submit it was open to the defence at that point as well as at the conclusion of the summing up to invite the judge to give an explicit warning about Barsby’s evidence. But that was not done and nor was any request made for such a direction in submissions before the summing up. We have a transcript of the discussion on various points to be covered in the summing up but the treatment of Barsby and indeed the other accomplices is not among them. We find this surprising. Be that as it may, the inescapable facts are that Barsby materially changed his evidence in court from his earlier witness statements greatly increasing Smith’s role and reducing his own. He had yet to be sentenced. The judge passed a sentence of 30 months imprisonment reducing by 75% from 10 years the sentence that he would have passed. This was further reduced on appeal.

We think the judge should have given a warning. As Lord Taylor of Gosforth L.J. said in Makanjuola at 1351D where a witness has been shown to be unreliable the judge may consider it necessary to urge caution. In a more extreme case, if the witness is shown to have lied, to have made previous false complaints or to bear the defendant some grudge, a stronger warning may be thought appropriate. Of course, as Lord Taylor made clear each case depends on its own particular facts. In the present case Barbsy gave no viable explanation for why he did not implicate Smith in his earlier statements but implicated him extensively in his evidence. Bearing in mind that there was, absent Barbsy, no case against Smith on counts 1 and 2 we cannot be satisfied of the safety of his conviction on those counts and his appeal must be allowed.

As to the money laundering conspiracy, Smith’s only argument is that the summing up was generally unfair. There was clear evidence to implicate Smith in the East Midlands incident which Smith did not refute by evidence of his own. Whilst it is true that the summing up was somewhat slanted against Smith, this was primarily in relation to Barbsy’s evidence and we are satisfied his conviction for the money laundering conspiracy is safe.

Arthur Dawes was tried only on count 3, conspiracy to launder money, on which he was convicted. His first ground of appeal relates to the summing up. The argument of Mr Gregory Bull Q.C., who has appeared for him before us as he did in the court below, is that the judge provided insufficient reference to the case of each defendant and that as the defences were, to an extent intertwined, deficiencies in relation to the summing up of one defendant’s case had a ‘knock on’ effect on the others. It is necessary to focus primarily however for present purposes on Arthur Dawes. At the very beginning of his summing up the judge said:

“You may think that it is now clear that Rebecca Bridge and Arthur Dawes were keeping the books for the UK end of a multimillion pound trade in illegal drugs, principally heroin because of the huge sums of money involved. The prosecution have asserted that and no one really has sought to persuade you otherwise. The Crown say that Rebecca Bridge knew what she was doing and Arthur Dawes knew both what she was doing and what he was doing.”

Mr Bull submits that it was never conceded this appellant knew the books were kept for a multimillion pound trade in drugs. His case was that the books were kept on behalf of Anthony Handley whom the appellant thought was involved in cigarette smuggling. The prosecution had to prove that the books were the books of the conspiracy and related directly to the supply of drugs. The judge’s comment, so it is submitted, could have led the jury to conclude without any further consideration that the prosecution’s case was correct.

It is pointed out by the Crown that the judge’s observation reflected the tacit admission of Arthur Dawes at the end of his case. Discussion with counsel prior to the summing up clarifies the position. As the judge pointed out the real question was, who knew what? Arthur Dawes case was that he believed the entries related to Handley’s cigarette smuggling. The judge’s comment might have been better phrased, but it seems to us the jury, having only recently being addressed by Mr Bull, can have been in no doubt what the defence case was.

It is important to look at how Arthur Dawes defence proceeded. When interviewed he mostly declined to answer questions albeit he did accept the £10,000 found at 5 Central Avenue was his. In particular he declined to answer questions about the observations at Newport Pagnell.

In his defence statement Arthur Dawes denied conspiring with anyone to launder the proceeds of drug trafficking or any other criminalactivity. Likewise he denied that the money counting machines related to laundering the proceeds of drug trafficking or any other criminalactivity. Further, he denied presence at Newport Pagnell service station when any money was handed over. The defence he put forward when he gave evidence was entirely new and had not been foreshadowed by anything he had said before.

The key aspects of the case against Arthur Dawes were the events at Newport Pagnell service station on 7 June 2003 and the ledger entries. Observations were undertaken in the parking area on the Northbound side of the M.1. This was based on information received by the police. A black London taxi arrived and the driver walked towards the services. Then a Passat drove in. Its driver was, as he eventually admitted at the trial, Arthur Dawes. He had a female passenger who, although never identified, was said by the Crown to be Rebecca Bridge. This Arthur Davies denied. A Tesco’s cool bag was taken from the boot and handed to the taxi driver who returned to his car and drove away. The taxi was stopped and the Tesco cool bag recovered. It contained two J.D Sports bags containing just under £100,000.

The Passat was not stopped but was seen later the same evening being driven by Arthur Dawes with Rebecca Bridge as the passenger. A number of shopping bags were seen which had not been seen in the car at Newport Pagnell.

Arthur Dawes changed his instructions during the trial accepting he was present at Newport Pagnell and that he handed over a bag containing money. He was with a woman, whom he did not name, but it was not Rebecca Bridge. He was handing over the money on behalf of Tony Handley, a recently convicted drug dealer in Birmingham. He said in evidence he had looked after the ledger for Handley for a short period and suspected Handley was involved in a cigarette smuggling operation. He never knew or suspected Handley was involved in drugs. Handley had contacted him and asked him to collect a woman. They drove to Newport Pagnell and handed over the bag of money. He did not think it was drug money but the proceeds of cigarette smuggling.

It was also Arthur Dawes evidence that there was reference in the ledgers to ‘Tony’ to whom large sums of money appeared to be going. He maintained this must be Handley.

It was suggested in cross-examination that Handley had recently been convicted and his name had appeared in the media; it was a convenient hook on which to hang his defence. Arthur Dawes’ response was he feared retaliation and he could only safely tell the true story now that Handley was safely locked up.

The judge in summing up to the jury told them there was one of two possibilities either he was telling the truth about Tony Handley and felt constrained to keep quiet about it until he was safely out of the way or he had taken advantage of a recent newspaper story as a useful hook on which to hang his new defence. We do not think that in the circumstances the judge was obliged to go further “to give adequate weight to the defence case.” In truth the last minute defence advanced by Arthur Dawes was no more than fanciful. Furthermore the judge did remind the jury about Arthur Dawes’ evidence on other aspects of the case at p132 and onwards of his summing up.

The other ground of appeal advanced on behalf of Arthur Dawes was that:

“The prosecution failed to provide any notice in relation to applications for public interest immunity and failed to disclose any information or evidence concerning a linked Dutch police investigation into the criminal activities of Robert Dawes and Anthony Handley.”

The Crown’s response is that no notice of any public interest immunity application was served on the defence because none was made. We repeat what we said earlier in relation to John Dawes. The ambit of disclosure to be given by the court is partly circumscribed by the defence as disclosed by the defence. In this case Tony Handley was only introduced into the defence in the course of the trial. But even had he been introduced earlier we do not think there was any information or material available to the prosecution they should have but failed to disclose.

Rebecca Bridge said little and did not give evidence. No freestanding ground of appeal is advanced on her behalf but she adopts and endorses the grounds advanced by the others. In particular John and Arthur Dawes. She submits that if John Dawes’ conviction is unsafe it has a “knock on” effect. Further she submits that if Arthur’s conviction is unsafe hers cannot stand. The Crown agree that her case stands or fails with Arthur Dawes.

The critical question in her case was her state of mind when she compiled the documents. We agree that if Arthur’s appeal against conviction succeeds her conviction cannot stand. However we are satisfied Arthur Dawes’ conviction is safe and so is hers. There was clear evidence against her unrefuted by any evidence from her.

It is submitted that the total sentence of 24 years for John Dawes was manifestly excessive. There were, however, three conspiracies and he was the major player in the United Kingdom. A particularly unpleasant feature was the manner of involvement of the accomplices and how John Dawes treated them. The judge presided over a 10 week trial and was thus very well placed to assess where on the scale of gravity the offences and the individuals fell. 24 years was at the top of the bracket but not manifestly excessive.

As to Arthur Dawes he fell to be sentenced for the money laundering only. In this he was heavily involved and was well aware of the entries in the books. Drug conspirators need money launderers as thieves need receivers. Money laundering cases vary infinitely on their facts. This was a very serious one being so close to the drug conspiracies and we cannot say 8 years was manifestly excessive. As to Smith, we can see nothing wrong with the sentence of 5 years for his part in the money laundering conspiracy.

The appeal against conviction of Ryan Smith on counts 1 and 2 (the drug conspiracies) is allowed. His appeal against conviction on count 3 (the money laundering conspiracy) is dismissed. His appeal against sentence on count 3 is dismissed.

John Dawes’ appeals against conviction and sentence are dismissed on all counts.

Arthur Dawes’ appeals against conviction and sentence on count 3 are dismissed.