AC-2024-LON-003165 - [2025] EWHC 2532 (Admin)

Murphy involved an appeal by case stated. Mrs Murphy was prosecuted and convicted in the magistrates’ court of offences under section 297 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 relating to the use of a non-UK service to stream Premier League football matches in the public house which she managed. The High Court proceedings were complex and protracted. After a reference to the Court of Justice of the European Union, they concluded with the Divisional Court quashing the convictions. In dealing with the application for costs, Stanley Burnton LJ said [3]:

“The principal issue that falls for decision is whether the parties’ costs should be determined under what we may call the civil costs regime or the criminal costs regime.”

On this issue he said:

“14.

Neither Mr Howe QC nor Mr Mellor QC was able to make any submission as to the criteria to be applied by this court for the purpose of deciding whether to apply the civil costs regime or the criminal costs regime. Nor did they refer to any authority that might guide us.

15.

Clearly, save in exceptional cases, prosecutions and appeals in criminal cases should be and will be subject to the criminal costs regime. However, the present case is unusual. …”

Stanley Burnton LJ went on to detail the unusual features of the case. The prosecution was brought to protect a very substantial commercial interest and was treated by the parties as a test case involving substantial legal resources on both sides. The hearings were said to have been “conducted in a manner indistinguishable from a hearing in the Chancery Division or before the Civil Division of the Court of Appeal in which substantial sums were in issue.” The proceedings were part of a broader campaign to protect a private interest. The court found that those unusual circumstances justified the application of the civil costs regime.