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Susan May

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West and Royton (Mr. Meacher) for giving me the opportunity not only to provide brief responses to the specific points that he raised, but to explain how this case has been handled so far. He will be familiar with much of that. I know that my right hon. Friend has maintained an interest in the case. I also know that since her conviction, Susan May has pursued her case with two appeals against the conviction, two applications to the Criminal Cases Review Commission and a complaint against the police. I should like to take the opportunity to say something brief about each of them. Afterwards, I shall deal with the specific points about disclosure and the Forensic Science Service. I am glad that we have a system that enables the Criminal Cases Review Commission to consider and reopen such cases, because I believe that if there has been a miscarriage of justice, we are most likely to be able to determine it through that mechanism. Let me start with the first appeal. Four years after her conviction, Susan May lost her first appeal on 14 February 1997. The Court of Appeal rejected the fresh medical evidence that Susan May had suffered a memory gap about the circumstances of her aunt’s death and said that it did not regard the conviction as unsafe. The appeal was followed by the first Criminal Cases Review Commission review. The case was one of several that was transferred to the commission from the Home Office in April 1997 following its establishment under the Criminal Appeal Act 1995. The commission considered an application from Susan May and concluded that it was worthy of further judicial scrutiny. In November 1999, the CCRC referred it to the Court of Appeal. In 1993, Susan May also made a complaint against the police, but because of her impending criminal trial, it remained on the table and stayed there until 1998 while she pursued her first appeal. Greater Manchester police carried out the investigation of the complaint under the supervision of the Police Complaints Authority in accordance with the procedure that then pertained. In July 1999, an investigation report was submitted to the Police Complaints Authority, which issued a statement to the effect that the complaint had been investigated to its satisfaction. After that, the investigation report was submitted to the Crown Prosecution Service, which closely examined the report and concluded that there was no evidence that could secure a conviction. The next step was to consider disciplinary action and, on 21 October 1999, Greater Manchester police submitted their proposals to the Police Complaints Authority. The Police Complaints Authority concluded that all bar one of the 22 allegations had not been substantiated because there was insufficient evidence to prove that any police officer had breached the police discipline code. The substantiated allegation was to do with an early interview by the police. It took place before Susan May’s arrest and before she was cautioned. As my right hon. Friend said, she wanted to make the point that she should have been regarded as a suspect and not a witness, thereby having full protection under the law. The Police Complaints Authority agreed with her, and that became one of the subjects of Susan May’s second appeal. At the second appeal, the Court of Appeal heard arguments on the bloodstained handprint on a wall at the murder scene and the treatment of Susan May as a witness rather than a suspect, thereby denying her the protection under the law in relation to various comments that she made. The appeal judges ruled that her conviction was not unsafe and dismissed the second appeal on 7 December 2001. Let me consider the second review by the CCRC. In August 2002, Mrs. May made a renewed application to the commission, and the second review is still going on. As my right hon. Friend knows, it would be inappropriate for me to discuss in detail the specific issues involved. I have inquired into that. The case is complex and I understand that the CCRC is carrying out several lines of investigation. A decision about whether to refer the case back to the Court of Appeal—I reiterate that that is a decision solely for the CCRC—will be made once its investigations are complete. In deciding whether to refer the case back to the Court of Appeal, the commission will apply the statutory test of whether there is a genuine possibility of the conviction being quashed. The decision on whether a conviction should be quashed rests with the Court of Appeal. That process means that I cannot deal with some of the detailed matters that my right hon. Friend raised.