ON APPEAL FROM
THE CROWN COURT AT WOOLWICH
His Honour Judge Nicholas Heathcote KC
T20207034
T20190866
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL |
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B e f o r e :
MR JUSTICE CHOUDHURY
and
MR JUSTICE BOURNE
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REX | ||
-and- | ||
MATTHEW HARROD |
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Mr J Thacker KC appeared on behalf of the Crown.
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Crown Copyright ©
Lord Justice Stuart-Smith:
The Facts
The current applications to adduce fresh evidence
i) Mr Taylor was in communication with someone given the nickname "Foxy" and referred to someone with the nickname "Wicker".
ii) Mr Jamie Hanna has been referred by the nickname "Fox" but not "Foxy".
iii) Mr Patrick Ince had an EncroChat phone with a handle "Alanwicker". He had numerous nicknames but none of them has been identified as "Wicker".
iv) A phone ending 0445 made numerous calls to Lee Taylor between 5 March 2019 and 14 January 2020. This phone number was not attributed to the applicant either at the time of his trial or since. The position at trial was the subject of agreed facts 170 and 171, which made clear that not only was the number not attributable to anyone in the case, it had also not had contact with any other person listed in the contact schedule during the periods of data obtained.
v) The subscriber to phone number 0445 has now been identified as having been the subscriber both during and since the conspiracy with which we are concerned but is not a person relevant to the present proceedings. The subscriber does not appear on the Police National Computer save in respect of a reference to the subscriber being either a victim of crime or a party involved in a non-crime domestic report, with the most recent report being in 2022. A check of the subscriber on police indices reveals no reference to "Foxy" or similar in relation to the subscriber. The prosecution maintains that the identity of the subscriber does not fall to be disclosed.
vi) There is an apparent nickname listed as XXX on Lee Taylor's machine. The Crown has identified that someone called "Cavan Hanna" used the nickname of "XX" and "XXXX" but not "XXX".
Discussion and Resolution