Too late, Too late, John Brannan, 'hostage of the state 1992 to his death in December 1998', cleared of murder

"It is noteworthy that a critical factor in the court's judgment was the failure by the crown to disclose material that would have undermined its case or supported that of the defence.

"After every miscarriage of justice, it is said that such miscarriages could not occur today because of the safeguards in place. Rules regarding disclosure are now more favourable to the crown than those in force at the time of this trial in 1992."

Campbell Malone

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Jail suicide victim is cleared of murder

    John Brannan took his life at Blundeston prison, Suffolk, three years ago, six years after being convicted of stabbing a man to death in a nightclub. Mr Brannan's co-accused, Bernard Murphy was freed from prison yesterday after the convictions were judged unsafe.

    The case is believed to be the first in British legal history in which a prisoner has been posthumously cleared of murder after dying while serving a life sentence. Two men, Derek Bentley and Mahmood Mattan, have been cleared after being sentenced to death and hanged.

    After being released at the Royal Courts of Justice in London Mr Murphy said: "I am just sorry that my friend John Brannan isn't here with me to hear his name cleared."

    Mr Murphy and Mr Brannan were convicted of killing Michael Pollitt, who died from a single knife wound to the stomach at the Express nightclub in Manchester on 24 June 1991. Their cases were referred back to the Court of Appeal by the Criminal Cases Review Commission, an independent body with the power to investigate possible miscarriages of justice.

    Mr Murphy and Mr Brannan, whose latest appeal was brought by his brother Lee, challenged their convictions in 1993 but were unsuccessful.

    At their trial, the Crown's case was that Mr Brannan struck the fatal blow and that he was acting jointly with Mr Murphy, who was armed with an axe and uttering threats against Mr Pollitt's life.

    Lawyers for Mr Brannan and Mr Murphy submitted during the appeal that fresh evidence showed Mr Pollitt had a gun or might well have had a gun with him at the time of his death, giving rise to a justification of self-defence.

    Giving judgment yesterday, Lord Justice Keene said the first ground of appeal put forward on behalf of both appellants was that in the light of fresh evidence there was a real possibility that the jury would have concluded that Mr Pollitt had or might have had a gun.

    The second was the Crown failed to disclose at trial material that was relevant to the defence. This consisted of four police documents on or before 1 July 1991 recording information received that Pollitt had had a gun. It was clear to the court, he said, that by the time the jury retired to consider its verdicts "a great deal of emphasis was being placed on the apparent fact that the first mention of Pollitt having had a gun had come eight days or so after the killing". Lord Justice Keene added: "Yet the undisclosed material reveals that from as early as June 26 1991, two days after the incident, the police had been receiving information from various sources to the effect that Pollitt had had a gun." Even under the disclosure rules at that time, these matters should have been disclosed, the judge said.

    He ruled: "Because of the way in which the issue of the gun became of central importance when the charges were left to the jury, we have concluded that the totality of the evidence now available on that topic, if given at trial, might reasonably have affected the decision of the jury to convict these two men.

By Ian Burrell, Home Affairs Correspondent, The Independent, 26 January 2002

http://www.independent.co.uk/story.jsp?story=116470