Jury trial to resume "as soon as practical": SCTS chief

Jury trials will restart in Scotland "as soon as it is practical and safe to do so", Scottish Courts & Tribunals Service chief executive Eric McQueen told MSPs today.

Giving evidence before the Scottish Parliament's Justice Committee today, Mr McQueen said it was for the Lord President to determine when jury trials could resume, based on assurances from justice agencies, the legal profession and victims' and witnesses' representatives that trials could safely proceed and conclude.

“The place for those assurances to be developed", he continued, "is within the short term working group on jury trials chaired by the Lord Justice Clerk, Lady Dorrian, and with all the necessary representatives involved, including Public Health Scotland. That group will make recommendations for the safe commencement of jury trials in Scotland as quickly as possible."

He added: "At this time Scotland remains in lockdown, but I can assure the Justice Committee that everyone is working incredibly hard to restart the jury trial process. This must be about assurances that jury trials that can proceed safely during the ongoing coronavirus situation, not about a date for recommencing. Those are the same assurances any potential juror or witness will require before coming to court this summer."

On the matter of trial backlogs, Mr McQueen pointed out: "But it is necessary to state that, in my view, reducing our capacity to hold jury trials by two-thirds of our capacity, to bring social distancing measures into place, will seriously impact on the courts’ ability to significantly reduce the trials backlog. By August the backlog we are facing could be 1,800 trial cases."

He further warned of a potential for the backlog to rise to 3,000 cases by next March, suggesting that while proposals were being worked on to hold some trials, and it was hoped a pilot programme could allow some jury trials to resume in "the early summer", three courtrooms would be needed for each trial to maintain social distancing. One would be for the actual proceedings, the second for the jury to retire to, and the third for members of the press and public, including families of victims and accused, to observe proceedings.

While in a normal week there would be 16 High Court trials, if social distancing measures were in place that would reduce to five a week.

"The backlog will remain with us until social distancing requirements are removed", he stated. "The Parliament has previously said judge-only trials are not acceptable, but I believe that option should remain on the table in the event that significant backlogs cannot be reduced by any other means."

Commenting on Mr McQueen's evidence, Ronnie Renucci QC, President of the Scottish Criminal Bar Association, reiterated his opposition to judge-only solemn trials.

"The SCBA recognises the scale of the challenges faced by the criminal justice system, but those challenges will not be solved without keeping justice at the centre of the solution", he insisted. "We are disappointed that once more the spectre of non-jury trials has been raised.

"Jury trials are fundamental to the pride that Scotland rightly has in its criminal legal system. We are resolute in our opposition to discarding them. Convenience should not trump justice."