The justice secretary has said she will attempt to sack the chair of the Criminal Cases Review Commission after a review found it failed a man who was wrongly jailed for 17 years.
Andrew Malkinson spent 17 years in jail for a rape offence that he did not commit, and was only exonerated last year.
An investigation into the CCRC’s role in the case by Chris Henley KC found that the Ministry of Justice-sponsored non-departmental public body had missed several opportunities to refer his case to appeal. The report, published last week, said the agency had “completely failed” Malkinson.
Following the release of the report, Mahmood said: “It is my firm view that Helen Pitcher is unfit to fulfil her duties as chair of the CCRC. I have therefore begun the process to seek her removal from that position.”
Malkinson welcomed the comments from Mahmood and said Pitcher had "proved herself utterly unfit to lead the CCRC".
He has also called for Pitcher's “discredited” senior leadership team to be fired and “replaced with people who are serious about fighting miscarriages of justice”. He said he hopes "this will be followed with a complete overhaul" of the CCRC.
But Pitcher told the Guardian that she believes she is “the best person” for the job and that she has been “credited by the MoJ for substantially turning the CCRC round”.
Malkinson was sentenced to life imprisonment in March 2004 with a minimum term of seven years, spending 17 years in prison before he was released. The Court of Appeal quashed his rape convictions in July 2023, almost 20 years after he was sentenced.
Malkinson made three applications to the CCRC in 2009, 2018 and 2021 for it to use its statutory powers to refer his case back to the Court of Appeal. The first two applications were refused. The third application led to a referral back to the Court of Appeal in January 2023, and ultimately the successful appeal hearing last July.
The report found, however, that the agency had only referred the case back to judges after Appeal, a legal charity acting for Malkinson, won a battle to have new DNA analysis conducted.
Henley said the case “demonstrates a deep-seated, system-wide, cultural reluctance, which starts right at the top in the Court of Appeal, to acknowledge our criminal justice system will on occasion make mistakes, that entirely innocent defendants will sometimes be convicted, and have this possibility at the forefront of our collective mind when trying and reviewing cases”.
Responding to the report, the CCRC said: “We deeply regret that our analysis and handling of Mr Malkinson’s case did not meet the standards we set for ourselves, and which applicants are entitled to expect, and we offer our wholehearted and unreserved apologies to Mr Malkinson.”
In a statement accompanying the report, Pitcher added: “Mr Henley’s report makes sobering reading, and it is clear from his findings that the commission failed Mr Malkinson.
“For this, I am deeply sorry and wish to offer my sincere regret and an unreserved apology on behalf of the commission.”
The report also warned that the CCRC is “hugely underfunded”.
Henley said: “The resources the CCRC has available is bound to impact on its capacity, and the quality of the work being undertaken. The work the CCRC undertakes is important and can be extremely challenging. To be an effective organisation it must comprise sufficient numbers of very able, experienced, motivated staff, all properly trained and effectively managed.”
The CCRC said it has asked the MoJ for a 15% increase for its 2024-25 budget allocation.
Pitcher said the commission has begun work to implement the nine recommendations in Henley’s report.