Andrews and Others v R

JurisdictionBahamas
JudgeBourke, P.
Judgment Date25 June 1973
Neutral CitationBS 1973 CA 4
Docket NumberNos: 8, 9, and 10 of 1973
CourtCourt of Appeal (Bahamas)
Date25 June 1973

Court of Appeal

Bourke, P.; Archer, J.A.; Hogan, J.A.

Nos: 8, 9, and 10 of 1973

Andrews

and Others

and
R
Appearances:

Keith Duncombe for James Andrews

Jeanne Thompson for James Strachan

David Bethell for Samuel Sands for the Crown

Gerald Collett, Attorney General and Langton Hilton, Solicitor General for the Crown.

Criminal Law - Murder — Appeal against conviction

Bourke, P.
1

On 18 June 1973, we gave judgment dismissing these appeals and intimated that we would give our reasons more fully later, which we now proceed to do.

2

The appellants James Andrews, James Strachan and Samuel Sands were convicted of the murder of Leonard Davis, Senior, and also of the offence of robbery on the same person being armed with a shot gun and a knife.

3

Leonard Davis met his death in the early hours of 27 December 1971, from the effects of a stab wound in the abdomen. There were admissions of robbery in statements by the accused. The appellants were charged with having jointly committed the offences. The principal evidence against the appellants lay in the statements made to the police by each of them. At the trial each accused denied making such a statement and put forward that it was concocted by the police. At the trial within a trial the Chief justice was satisfied beyond any reasonable doubt that the statements were freely and voluntarily given by the accused and they were admitted in evidence.

4

At the outset of the trial applications for separate trials were made on behalf of the accused Andrews and Strachan. The applications were refused. It was put forward on behalf of the appellant Strachan that the judge did not exercise his discretion properly in disallowing a separate trial. We found no substance in this ground of appeal and did not find it necessary to call on the Attorney General to answer it. In the course of a careful summing up the judge of trial was at pains repeatedly to direct the jury and stress that though the accused were charged jointly and tried together, the evidence against each one of them must be regarded individually and separately, and the statement of each accused given to the police must be taken as evidence affecting the maker alone and in no way as evidence against a co-accused.

5

The following grounds of appeal were relied on for the appellant Sands: (1) That the judge erred in law in his summation by directing the jury that the jury should apply the concept of joint criminal responsibility in...

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