Court of Appeal, Criminal Division

Published April 28, 2008

Regina v Greaves

Accompanying papers of great bulk and some complexity did not turn an unarguable, unmeritorious, application for leave to appeal against conviction into one which was arguable; nor did bulk and complexity operate as some kind of unspoken barrier to making a loss-of-time order under section 29 of the Criminal Appeal Act 1968.

The Court of Appeal (Sir Igor Judge, President, Mr Justice Gross and Mr Justice Blair) so held on March 11, 2008, when refusing an application by Claude Clifford Greaves for leave to appeal against his conviction at Southwark Crown Court, before Judge Robbins, on his plea of guilty to three counts of false accounting, contrary to section 17 of the Theft Act 1968 and one count of aiding and abetting fraudulent trading, contrary to section 458 of the Companies Act 1985, for which he was imprisoned for concurrent terms of three years.

THE PRESIDENT, giving the judgment of the court, said that the lack of merit in this renewed application had had to be clawed out of the bulky papers, which meant that a good deal of work had had to be done and substantial court time set aside to enable it to be dealt with. Justice for cases with merit had thereby been delayed which was unfair to those appellants.

If the applicant had still been serving his sentence, their Lordships would unhesitatingly have ordered that the period on remand in custody should not count towards his sentence.

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