R v O'Sullivan
[2024] EWHC 1318 (SCCO)
R v Abada
11 November 2022
[2022] EWHC 2926 (SCCO)
Senior Courts Costs Office
Three lawyers appealed because they thought they should get paid twice for one case. They argued that because the case started with two separate charges, they should get paid for each. The judge said that because the charges were combined into one later, it's one case and one payment.
Key Facts
- •Three appeals against decisions of Determining Officers refusing additional fees under the Legal Aid (Remuneration) Regulations 2013.
- •Appellants represented the defendant in a criminal case where multiple indictments were joined.
- •The core issue: whether the appellants were entitled to two separate fees because two indictments were initially preferred and later joined into one.
- •Appellants initially argued indictments B11 and B12 were separate, then shifted to arguing B3 and B6 were separate before joinder.
- •Indictments B3 and B6 were formally joined on 8 June 2021; the defendant pleaded guilty on 20 October 2021, sentenced in January 2022 following a Newton hearing.
- •Determining Officers held there was only one case, therefore only one fee was payable.
Legal Principles
Definition of 'case' in the Legal Aid (Remuneration) Regulations 2013: proceedings in the Crown Court against one assisted person on one or more counts of a single indictment.
Schedule 1 and Schedule 2 of the 2013 Regulations
Where defendants are joined onto one indictment or a single defendant has separate matters subsequently joined, there is one case and one fee.
Crown Court Fee Guidance, para 2.2 and 2.3
Multiple defendants tried together on the same indictment constitute one case, regardless of different case numbers.
R v Eddowes, Perry, and Osbourne [2011] EWHC 420 (QB)
Where multiple indictments are effectively joined, whether formally or by preferring a new indictment and staying/quashing others, there is only one case and one fee.
R v Arbas-Khan [2019], R v Hall, R v Wharton, R v Nash, R v Gary Moore [2022] EWHC 1659 (SCCO)
If indictments are not joined, there are separate cases and fees are due for each.
R v Hussain & Others [2011] 4 Costs LR 689
Outcomes
Appeals dismissed.
The Regulations should be interpreted mechanistically. After joinder of indictments B3 and B6, there was one indictment and one case. The subsequent amendments did not create further cases. The court rejected the argument that the pre-joinder situation should determine the fee.
Overpayments to advocates should be recovered under regulation 25 of Schedule 1.
Additional fees were paid in error based on the incorrect assumption of multiple cases.