R v Ronald De Souza

THE VICE-PRESIDENT: Nearly 53 years ago, in September 1972, Mr Ronald De Souza and a number of other accused stood trial at the Central Criminal Court on charges relating to an alleged attempt to rob a passenger on a London Underground train. Mr De Souza was convicted of attempted robbery and was sentenced to six months' detention.

In March 1973 Mr De Souza’s application for leave to appeal against his conviction was refused by the single judge and was not renewed. His case now returns to this court on a Reference by the Criminal Cases Review Commission ("CCRC") to whom we are grateful. The Reference takes effect as an appeal against conviction.

We record at the outset that the hearing of the appeal has taken place in the absence of Mr De Souza. The circumstances in which that has happened can briefly be summarised as follows.

Mr De Souza has been acting in person for the purposes of his appeal. It appears that there had at an earlier stage of the appeal proceedings been a misunderstanding as to whether or not he was represented by a particular firm of solicitors, and Mr De Souza has complained that documents were sent to those solicitors rather than to him.

On two occasions in the last few days Mr De Souza has applied to adjourn the appeal. It should be noted that, although seeking a direction that the case should not proceed today, Mr De Souza by clear implication did wish his appeal to proceed at some stage.

Each of the applications for an adjournment was refused. That was because the appeal is not opposed by the respondent and it is plainly in the interests of justice, and in the interests of Mr De Souza himself, that it should be considered by the court as soon as possible. That point was made to Mr De Souza on both the occasions when his application for an adjournment was refused.

The reasons why he wishes the matter to be adjourned do not, with respect, emerge with clarity from the documents he has sent to the court. He suggests that the court presently has no jurisdiction to hear the appeal. We have no doubt that he is mistaken in that belief. Mr De Souza also suggests that the appeal must be adjourned "pending rectification". The court is satisfied that there is no matter which requires rectification before the appeal can properly be heard.

Given Mr De Souza's experiences as a very young man, to which we shall come in a moment, it would be entirely understandable that he should be mistrustful of authority and of legal process, and we sympathise with him. We are nonetheless satisfied that there is no good reason why the hearing cannot proceed today, and we have no doubt that it is very much in the interests of justice, and in the interests of Mr De Souza, that it should proceed today.

Mr De Souza is undoubtedly aware of the date and time of the hearing, because of his two unsuccessful applications for an adjournment. He has not given notice of abandonment of his appeal, and no communication has been received from him in the last few hours. He was not present in court when the case was first called on at 10.30 am this morning, nor was he present when the court next called the case on for hearing shortly after 11.05 am.

We will therefore proceed to hear and determine the appeal in Mr De Souza’s absence. We have the power to do so notwithstanding that Mr De Souza, as an appellant, is entitled to be present. The conventional course adopted by the court in such circumstances, and which will be adopted in this case, is that after the court has given its judgment a letter is sent to the absent appellant inviting him in effect to put forward any matter which he would have wished to raise with the court had he been present and which he suggests would have resulted in a more favourable outcome from his point of view. If any such communication is received from Mr De Souza in the future, the court will consider whether the case needs to be listed for further hearing.

We now move to the substance of our judgment.

Mr De Souza's co-accused, who were also convicted and also received custodial sentences in 1972, were Paul Green (convicted of assault with intent to rob), Courtney Harriott (convicted of assault with intent to rob and having an offensive weapon), Cleveland Davison (convicted of attempted robbery) and Texo Johnson (convicted of assault with intent to rob). The cases of each of those four men have previously been referred to this court by the CCRC, and all their convictions have been quashed. Mr De Souza, for understandable personal reasons, did not apply to have his case referred at the same time; but he subsequently made that application, and so his case now comes before us.

In very brief summary of the facts, Mr De Souza, then aged just 17, and his co-accused were travelling together on the underground. They boarded a train at Stockwell Station. An officer of the British Transport Police (“BTP”), DS Ridgewell, gave evidence that he was also on that train. He was a member of an "anti-mugging" squad which had recently been established by the BTP in response to muggings, thefts and pick pocketing on the London Underground. His evidence, and the basis of the prosecution case at trial, was that Mr Harriott threatened him with a knife and demanded his wallet, and Mr Johnson punched him. DS Ridgewell gave evidence that he had identified himself as a police officer and struck Mr Harriott with his truncheon, whereupon he was assaulted by the group. His evidence was that with assistance from other officers he was able forcibly to restrain the accused, who were taken off the train and arrested.

Mr De Souza and his co-accused all denied that they had committed any offences and denied that events had happened as DS Ridgewell alleged. They asserted that they had been set up by the police officers, subjected to violence by the police and coerced into making statements. It may be noted that the only defendant acquitted at the trial was a young man who was able to establish that his ability to read and write English were not good enough for him to have read and understood the statement which he signed.

The BTP anti-mugging squad was disbanded in 1973 as a result of concerns about the conduct of DS Ridgewell and other officers in the squad. These included observations made by judges in other cases about unreliable police evidence and fabricated confessions. Despite those expressed concerns, DS Ridgewell's work was not in any way investigated by BTP. Instead, he was moved to a leading role in a squad investigating thefts of goods in transit from a British Rail parcel depot in South London known as the Bricklayers' Arms Depot.

In May 1978 DS Ridgewell was himself arrested for conspiracy to steal. On 21 January 1980 he pleaded guilty to an offence of conspiracy to steal and sentenced to seven years' imprisonment. The conspiracy started in 1977 and continued for about 18 months. It involved two other BTP officers, DC Ellis and DC Keeling, and two civilians. It involved the theft of parcels from the Bricklayers' Arms Parcel Depot. In other words, DS Ridgewell and others were stealing from that depot whilst themselves purportedly investigating offences of theft there.

Ridgewell died in prison in December 1982 whilst serving his sentence.

Very regrettably, none of the cases in which defendants had been convicted in reliance on the evidence of Ridgewell was then reviewed by the BTP. Many years passed before the CCRC was asked to, and did, refer one such case to this court, which resulted in a successful appeal in 2018. The CCRC thereafter made further investigations into the conduct of Ridgewell and officers associated with him, and further referrals were made to this court. Collectively they showed what Lord Burnett, CJ referred to in one of the cases as an "accumulating body of evidence concerning the integrity of DS Ridgewell and the teams that he led".

The basis on which the CCRC referred Mr De Souza's case to this court is that there is now fresh evidence which shows that Ridgewell's evidence at trial was unreliable and the conviction of Mr De Souza therefore unsafe. The CCRC relied in particular on the fact and circumstances of Ridgewell's conviction in 1980 and the successful appeals of Mr De Souza's four co-accused on the same basis.

The grounds on which the CCRC referred the case to this court take effect as Mr De Souza's grounds of appeal against conviction. He might have added to or amended them if he wished to do so, but he was under no obligation to do so, and the court accordingly has jurisdiction to determine the appeal on the basis of those grounds.

As we have already indicated, the appeal is not resisted by the respondent. Miss Robertson accepts that Mr De Souza's case is materially indistinguishable from those of Messrs Green, Harriott, Davison and Johnson. She further accepts that, as in those cases, the fresh evidence showing the dishonesty of the police officers concerned, and the consequent undermining of the prosecution case, is admissible under section 23 of the Criminal Appeal Act 1968 and renders Mr De Souza's conviction unsafe.

Those concessions, properly and fairly made by the respondent, are plainly correct. The evidence of Ridgewell was central to the prosecution case against Mr De Souza. The fresh evidence shows it to have been wholly unreliable, and provides positive support for the account given by Mr De Souza and his co-accused.

We formally receive the fresh evidence, in the light of which Mr De Souza's convictions are plainly unsafe. Miss Robertson has helpfully indicated that if this court quashes the conviction there will be no application for a retrial.

We regret that Mr De Souza has not attended today and the court has therefore not heard oral submissions from him. But for the reasons we have indicated, we have grounds of appeal on which this court can properly proceed and it is plainly appropriate that this injustice, which has continued for decades, should be ended as soon as possible.

We note finally that both the jury at the trial in 1972, and the single judge who refused the application for leave to appeal in 1973, were of course unaware of the corruption and dishonesty of Ridgewell, which was only exposed many years later. The result of that corruption and dishonesty is that Mr De Souza has sadly carried the burden of his wrongful conviction throughout his adult life. We regret that this court cannot now put right all that he has suffered over more than half a century. However, we can and do allow his appeal and quash his conviction.

As we have indicated earlier in this judgment, we will ask that the Registrar of Criminal Appeals write to Mr De Souza informing him of the outcome of his appeal and give him the opportunity, if he wishes, to bring to the attention of the court any matter which he would have wanted to raise had he been present today and which he suggests would have materially affected the decision of the court. Should any such submissions be received from Mr De Souza, they will of course be considered and a further hearing will, if necessary, be arranged.