Injustice

Tilting the Balance – 7 ways our justice system favours conviction of the innocent over acquittal of the guilty

Reading Time: 10 minutes The Law Commission’s ongoing review of the criminal appeals system completed its pre-consultation phase last week, examining a raft of proposed reforms to the way our State institutions respond to potential miscarriages of justice. I was immediately struck by a well-intentioned but highly questionable passage in the Law Commission’s Issues...

Bias and Injustice – A David and Goliath Story

Reading Time: 4 minutes Samuel Alexander disappeared in 2009. His body was later found buried at his family home. Despite a lack of DNA, eyewitnesses, or murder weapon – and with no cause or date of death – his only son Mark was convicted of murder. A law graduate, Mark has been investigating his...

The Many Lives of Samuel Alexander

Reading Time: 12 minutes Born in 1939, Samuel grew up in Egypt while it was still a British protectorate. His family worked in medicine and pharmaceuticals, but faced real poverty. After moving from Alexandria to Cairo, they lived in an apartment block without electricity or running water. As part of the minority Christian group...

exhausted man rubbing eyes

10 things the Daily Mail got wrong about the trial of Mark Alexander

Reading Time: 5 minutes This article could just as easily have been called ’Ten ways the Daily Mail were misled by the crown prosecution service’, because in many ways the press isn’t to blame for the inaccuracies and calculated falsehoods recited in the prosecution’s opening speech – which they perhaps naturally, albeit uncritically, relied...

Mark issues statement regarding CCRC’s refusal to refer his case

Reading Time: 6 minutes In 2015, the CCRC opted not to refer our first application to the Court of Appeal In spite of the new evidence we presented to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), it has decided not to refer my case to the Court of Appeal. This is because the CCRC do...

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CCRC response to formal complaint

Reading Time: < 1 minute This was the CCRC’s formal response to Mark’s complaint, following their decision not to refer his case to the Court of Appeal. You can read Mark’s reaction here.