A New Kind of Crown Court

In his report, about how to tackle the 76,000 case Crown Court backlog, Brian Leveson has put forward the idea of a new sort of Crown Court.

The suggested name is the ‘District Bench of the Crown Court’ and it will see a full-time Crown Court Judge sitting with two Magistrates to determine guilt or innocence in Crown Court cases where the maximum sentence is two years or less.

Dangerous driving, aggravated TWOC, assaults on emergency workers, racially aggravated breaches of the peace, and some malicious communication offences would be the day-to-day diet of the new court.

It isn’t yet clear whether representation would be limited to barristers and HCAs or whether the court might be open to non-HCA solicitors. Similarly, it’s unclear whether funding for defendants would follow the model of legal aid in the Magistrates Court or the current Crown Court system where there are fees for litigators and advocates.

Increasing the numbers of Judges or Recorders to staff the new courts would obviously mean there were fewer practitioners available to take on representation in Crown Court and District Crown Court cases. The hope would be that Chambers would offer a greater number of pupilages or that solicitors would more-happily apply for Higher Rights as the new tribunal would be very similar to appearing before a District Judge in the Magistrates Court.

No one knows how things will actually shake down but at The Johnson Partnership we are keeping on top of all the developments surrounding this new judicial beast.