What Lessons To Learn? -- I

In February 2001 Michael Stannard was sentenced to four-and-a-half years' imprisonment. He had been convicted of cheating the public revenue (in common language tax evasion). This article looks at some of the issues raised by this case and lessons which may be learnt from it.

Disclaimer

The author has never met either defendant nor acted for them. An advantage of this is that he can look at the matter with an element of impartiality. On the other hand only someone professionally involved in the case could hope to master all the evidence of a 50-day case. This article is mainly based on a study of the summing up which lasted two days.

A case of this size throws up many issues. One cannot address them all in one article or say all that could be said on any one of them....