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View Full Version : Dramatic development in robberies trial



Nwicker60
06-Sep-11, 19:07
Dropped!-three of charges

counsel claim no case to answer on some of others

THE two men, accused of a string of break-ins in the Highlands have have had some of the charges against them dropped.
The dramatic development came after senior fiscal depute, David Barclay, closed the prosecution case today.
He said that he was not seeking a conviction on three of the charges on the indictment.
One of them relates to a car alleged to have been stolen by John Hind and Matthew Peters from the Old School House at Lochailort, on October 12, 2007. Also dropped was a charge that they assaulted Constable Andrew Cooper after he signalled them to stop on the Mallaig to Ft William road, on the same day, and causing him to jump out of the way to avoid being struck.
The third charge, against John Hind alone, alleged he refused to identify the driver. A formal verdict of not guilty in all three charges was returned, by Sheriff Andrew Berry.
The jury was released early, today pending legal submissions by defence counsel that there is no case to answer with regard to some of the other charges.
Hind (54) from Colne, in Lancashire and Peters (40) from Bournemouth, deny breaking into 12 sub-post offices and commercial premises, in the Highlands and northeast, and stealing cash totalling £34,947 and stock amounting to £10,508.
Earlier, Maria Wright, an Inverness based analyst with Northern Constabulary, was cross-examined about a report she had produced from data which were linked to the two accused’s movements through phones recovered by the police.
From the pattern she was able to trace, she agreed that “these phones got about a bit” and it appeared that the accused, had, in general, travelled north one day and returned south the next.
She conceded that she was not a phone mapping expert who could have spoken in depth about the masts and signals available, at the time of the offences.
Ms Wright agreed with advocate Alan Macleod for Peters, that if the information provided by o2 was inaccurate, her analysis would be too and that her analysis was only as good as the information provided.
Mr Macleod: “You have assumed the information you received is accurate but you can’t say whether it is, or not. You have heard of the saying-“There are three kinds of lies, lies, damn lies and statistics, said to have been attributed to Benjamin Disraeli. I suppose that, as someone who works in statistics, it is not something you would agree with.”
Ms Wright: “Not particularly”
Mr Macleod: “Would you agree that statistics are not always accurate and that the problem with them is that, quite often, you don’t get the full picture.”
Ms Wright: “That is correct, yes.”
Mr Macleod: “That criticism, can, to some degree, be applied to your report.”
Ms Wright: “To some degree.”
She agreed that it would be sensible to have had a telephone mapping expert giving evidence and that certain technical investigations had not been carried out. This would have provided information about the provision and location of masts and whether or not there had been changes, in networks which frequently happened in the mobile phone business, between 2007 when the alleged offences occurred, and the date on document provided by o2, in 2008.
Ms Wright agreed that there was no evidence that the mobile phone said to belong to Peters had left the Manchester area on the day he was alleged to have broken into the Kyle post office.
Mr Macleod: “Would it be fair to say that there was only one call from the phone believed to belong to Peters, on the day of the Embo post office robbery, September 2/4, and that it was made from Manchester, 417 miles south of Embo.?”
Ms Wright: “That is correct, yes.”
Mr Macleod: “A mobile telephone in Norway would have been closer that the one used in Manchester.”
She agreed with him that mobiles did not always get their signal from the nearest mast and said it wasn’t possible to know who had been using a given phone.
Mr Macleod: “You can’t see that Mr Peters was using that phone on any of the dates that break-ins took place?”
Miss Wright: “no
Mr Macleod: “You can’t say that he was using the mast in any of the locations that break-ins took place.”
Ms Wright: “That is correct, yes.”
The trial, now it its fifth week, continues.