Mr GA

In February 2004, at Kingston-upon-Thames Crown Court, Mr GA was convicted of indecently assaulting two women in separate incidents in Tooting, South London, in the summer of 2001.

Mr GA denied having anything to do with the indecent assaults. The central issue in proceedings against Mr GA was whether or not he had been correctly identified as the attacker.

In 2002, a jury decided that, because of mental health issues, Mr GA was not fit to plead in a full criminal trial. A trial of the facts was therefore held in which Mr GA played no active part.

In spite of alibi testimony from a member of Mr GA’s family, the jury in the trial of the facts concluded that he had carried out the indecent assaults.

The judge made a hospital order with restrictions under section 41 of the Mental Health Act 1983. The effect of that order was to have Mr GA detained in hospital. His name was also added indefinitely to the Sex Offenders’ Register.

Mr GA’s legal representatives applied to the Court of Appeal for leave to appeal against the verdict in the trial of the facts, but the application was refused.

In February 2004, when Mr GA’s mental health had improved, he faced a full criminal trial for the offences. He pleaded not guilty but was convicted. The judge imposed another hospital order with restrictions.

No attempt was made to appeal against the conviction. The CCRC received an application for review of the conviction in June 2017.

During its review the CCRC used its section 17 powers extensively to obtain material from the police, the Crown Court, the Court of Appeal, National Offender Management Service, NHS records and the Forensic Archive.

The Crown Prosecution Service no longer had any papers and the defence solicitors had gone out of business and their files destroyed.

The CCRC contacted members of Mr GA’s family as well as defence counsel in both the 2002 trial of the facts and the 2004 full trial, but details about the investigation and proceedings, and particularly the full trial, were scarce.

The CCRC also explored forensics in the case. Neither the police nor the Forensic Archive had retained any objects relating to the offences, such as a mobile phone which had featured in the police investigation. The phone had been swabbed for DNA but testing had produced no usable evidence.

However, the CCRC identified a potential forensic opportunity in using modern DNA techniques, if any samples extracted from the swabs used in the examination of the phone had survived.

The Forensic Archive located the samples and the CCRC arranged for DNA testing. The test yielded one male DNA profile, which was submitted for a one-off speculative search of the National DNA Database. The search yielded one good match with an SGM+ profile on the DNA database.

When the CCRC investigated that person’s background, it was found that he had been local to the area in which the attacks occurred.

Further, contemporary police records suggested that he was a good match, and arguably a better match than Mr GA, for the descriptions that the victims had given of the offender. He also had a conviction for a different kind of sexual offence committed in Tooting in 2003.

The CCRC concluded that the new information in relation to the DNA extracted from the mobile phone, and around the identification of Mr GA as the attacker, raised a real possibility that the Court of Appeal would quash his conviction.

The CCRC referred the conviction in September 2020.

The Court of Appeal quashed the conviction in February 2021.