Pendleton, Donald

Donald Pendleton was convicted in June 1986 of a murder and received a sentence of life imprisonment.

The CCRC received an application for review of the conviction in April 1997.

The CCRC determined that Mr Pendleton had been intensively interviewed by police officers in 11 interviews over three days without the presence of a solicitor before he confessed to the murder.

The confession was central to the prosecution case at trial.

The CCRC referred the conviction in February 1999 on the basis of fresh expert psychiatric evidence that, having regard to Mr Pendleton’s vulnerabilities, the confession was unreliable.

The CCRC considered that had this evidence been available at trial, it would have called into question the admissibility of the interview evidence and would have fundamentally altered the conduct of Mr Pendleton’s defence.

The Court of Appeal upheld the conviction in December 2001.

The Court of Appeal’s decision was then appealed to the House of Lords which allowed the appeal.

The Court of Appeal subsequently quashed the conviction in January 2002.