A few years back, AR1 (Mrs) was in court at the committal of a suspect Mr A, who was charged that on a certain date he murdered Mr X.
The evidence laid before the court was Mr A was seen on CCTV entering a street prior to where Mr X being found. That an object with Mr A's DNA on it was found in the vicinity of Mr X's body.
Unfortunately, the CCTV didn't show either of them leaving. Mr X was found unconscious in the early hours and died shortly afterwards.
In the pre court discussion the CPS and Police were adamant that they had the chap involved.
Eventually, after being remanded in custody and facing a trial by jury, Mr A was acquitted of the Manslaughter (the eventual charge) of Mr X.
Despite the confidence at the time of the investigation that they had their man, following a case review, some years later Mr Xs friend was charged and convicted for Manslaughter. A Man who had been interviewed during the initial case, as he was drinking with the victim that evening.
Blinded by tech and DNA the police were utterly focused on nailing Mr A. They were wrong, and a young man was perilously close to being locked up for a long time. This could be any of us making a turn in front of a camera, and dropping a bit of a takeaway. We all require the right to a proper and full investigation to protect us from injustice, and to ensure when an offence does arrive in court its done as a result of investigating with an open mind.
Equally, we need to park our own emotionally based judgments, or at least sometimes keep them to ourselves. - Out.
Last edited by AR1; 28th Mar 2018 at 23:21.
Reason: Spooling Mistook.