Criminal Litigation

This is the process by which a person, whether victim, suspect, defendant or witness, travels the unwanted journey through the criminal justice system from which coppers, lawyers, journalists and a myriad of penpushers make their living. 

The aim of this section of the site is to take the reader through the criminal justice process, step by step. Hopefull this will impart a good working knowledge of the subject foir use by the writer, filmaker or those sad wretches who study the subject for the sake of it. Anyway, let's try to keep a sad subject cheerful, so...

Reasons to be cheerful,

Part One

Police Powers

There are numerous laws that bestow upon society's finest the power to stop, search, assault, lock up and seize property from members of the public.

The most commonly applied of these is the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, 1984. (PACE) Let's go through some of the important sections of this devastatingly powerful piece of legislation.

Stop and Search

Section 1 of PACE gives a constable (that means a copper of any rank) the power to stop and search any person in a public place who he reasonably suspect to be in possession of:

stolen articles,

offensive weapons,

articles for use in burglary, theft (including taking a motor vehicle) or fraud,

any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed, except a folding pocket knife unless the blade of the said folding pocket knife has a cutting edge of more than three inches.