202302376 B1 - [2025] EWCA Crim 1036

This is an appeal against conviction by leave of the full court. The appellant, Justin Plummer, then aged 50, was convicted on 19 June 2023 of the murder of Janice Cartwright-Gilbert who died on 28 February 1997. There was no doubt that she had been murdered and the issue for the jury was whether they were sure that it was the appellant who had committed the crime.

The prosecution case was based on an alleged confession which was said to have been made by the appellant to a fellow prisoner, Christopher Dunne, while on remand for other offences in Bedford Prison in June 1997. The confession was recorded in a witness statement dated 18 December 1997 by Mr Dunne. In June 1997, it was agreed, Mr Dunne shared a cell with the appellant, and the witness statement says that in two conversations, while he was intoxicated with cannabis, the appellant confessed to a number of crimes, including the murder of Ms. Cartwright-Gilbert.

Mr. Dunne died in 1999. The witness statement he had made was read to the jury by leave of the judge, who ruled that it was admissible as hearsay evidence, applying section 121 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003. He further ruled that it should not be excluded under either section 126 of that Act or section 78 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984. He did not consider after the close of the prosecution case whether the evidence was so unconvincing that the appellant’s conviction would be unsafe as required by section 125 of the 2003 Act, and was not asked to do so.

We record at the outset our gratitude for the assistance we have received from counsel in their written and oral submissions. We shall not in this judgement mention all of the many points which were argued which will summarise the competing arguments briefly but we have considered them all.