Tag: Evidence

Witnesses – Credibility and Probative Value

On Friday 3 August 2018 HHJ Simon Barker QC, sitting as a Deputy High Court Judge, handed down judgment in Saeed v Ibrahim [2018] EWHC 1804 (Ch).  The case concerned a claim for declarations, accounts or restitution or damages arising from property and other transactions involving some or all of the various parties.

Whilst the Claimants were ultimately successful, the interest of the case for this article’s purpose is the nature of the oral evidence heard by the court.  It is clear from the judgment that there were, perhaps not unusually serious issues arising from the oral evidence heard at trail.  That clearly had relevance to the case itself but also provides an opportunity to review certain of the issues and factors surrounding the use and selection of witnesses.  For example:

(a) Quality of Witness Statements

It should go without saying but frequently needs to be said that a person needs to understand and approve their statement in considered, clear and logical fashion, if only to avoid the conclusion HHJ Simon Barker QC reached here:

“12.  When giving his oral evidence, D1 spent some time making significant corrections to and clarifications of 10 of the 49 paragraphs of his main witness statement. Mr Ghaffar submitted that in their evidence his clients, that is D1 and D3 for this purpose (D1 purported to give evidence on behalf of D5), did their best to tell the truth but, Mr Ghaffar conceded, there were aspects of their evidence which were unsatisfactory.”

(b) Problems with Oral Evidence

Of course one can never entirely legislate for what a witness will say when called to give their evidence orally but “car crash” performances rarely if ever win the day:

13. …Mr Briggs submitted that D1 was an exceptionally evasive and unsatisfactory witness…D1 was unable to answer questions; other occasions when D1 launched into tangential speeches as answers; various occasions on which he blamed his solicitors for shortcomings (flaws in his witness statement, disclosure shortcomings including in relation to powers of attorney in his sons’ names, and inconsistencies between his pleaded case and his evidence). In addition, during cross-examination D1 admitted that C1 had indeed brought cash in a holdall or bag to his home, admitted the existence of documentation reflecting money transfers through AR to C1, and referred to meetings (initially one, then two, and finally three) with a lawyer about trust deeds. At one point in cross-examination, D1 referred to C1 having brought cash to him at his home “so many times” that he could not say whether or not he had done so on the occasion the subject of the question. From the outset of his oral evidence D1 appeared confident in his answers. He showed no signs of concern or embarrassment when challenged on his probity (e.g. why he failed to make income tax returns when he had annual rental income in the order of £50,000), his lack of concern about the accuracy of conveyancing documents to effect property transfers (e.g. the transfer of 37LR to D3 in October 2005), and when, as not infrequently happened, he was caught out in lies. When giving evidence about his means and access to money (two examples are the use of family members as nominee holders of accounts and the use and whereabouts of an advance inheritance of several hundred thousand pounds said to have been received from his father) D1 was persistently evasive. To describe D1 as an unimpressive witness would fall well short of the mark.”

The Claimant’s counsel had in this context referred to Painter v Hutchinson [2007] EWHC 758 (Ch) to support his attack on the First Defendant’s credibility, in particular paragraph 3 of the judgment of Mr Justice Lewison (as he then was):

“However, in addition to having been convicted of dishonesty in the past, Mr Hutchison was also a very unsatisfactory witness. Even Miss Rich did not suggest that his evidence was reliable. I will give detailed examples later, but for now I summarise my general impression. He was evasive and argumentative. He would launch into tangential speeches when confronted by questions that he could not answer consistently with his case. He attempted to place the most strained readings on the plain words of his pleaded case and his principal witness statement. He was free with allegations that his previous solicitors and counsel had made mistakes in accurately recording his instructions. At times he gave self-contradictory answers within the space of a few minutes of his evidence. New allegations emerged in the course of his cross-examination which had not previously formed part of his pleaded case or his written evidence. It was impossible not to conclude that they had been made up on the spot. In the course of his cross-examination of Mr Hutchison Mr Cowen convincingly demonstrated to my mind that Mr Hutchison’s case had shifted in important respects either in response to evidence given by Mr Painter or in response to documents that had emerged on disclosure. It changed again and again in the witness box itself. His disclosure of documents has been lamentable and highly selective. In my judgment he has deliberately and dishonestly fabricated evidence in order to try to accommodate what was indisputable within the overall framework of his story.”

(c) “Pointless” selection of witness

Sometimes no witness may be better than the one selected.  It is sufficient under this sub-heading to simply set out in full paragraph 17 of the Judgment:

“Mr Javed Qamar (‘JQ’) is a long-standing friend of C1 and, to some extent, a funder of C1 in this case. In closing submissions, Mr Briggs accepted that JQ’s evidence was partisan. I disregard his evidence.”

(d) Passage of time & recollection

Reference was made to the fascinating and apposite remarks of Mr Justice Leggatt (as he then was) in Gestmin SGPS SA v Credit Suisse (UK) Ltd [2013] EWHC 3560 (Comm), albeit with reference to commercial cases:

“15. An obvious difficulty which affects allegations and oral evidence based on recollection of events which occurred several years ago is the unreliability of human memory.
 
16. While everyone knows that memory is fallible, I do not believe that the legal system has sufficiently absorbed the lessons of a century of psychological research into the nature of memory and the unreliability of eyewitness testimony. One of the most important lessons of such research is that in everyday life we are not aware of the extent to which our own and other people’s memories are unreliable and believe our memories to be more faithful than they are. Two common (and related) errors are to suppose: (1) that the stronger and more vivid is our feeling or experience of recollection, the more likely the recollection is to be accurate; and (2) that the more confident another person is in their recollection, the more likely their recollection is to be accurate.
 
17. Underlying both these errors is a faulty model of memory as a mental record which is fixed at the time of experience of an event and then fades (more or less slowly) over time. In fact, psychological research has demonstrated that memories are fluid and malleable, being constantly rewritten whenever they are retrieved. This is true even of so-called ‘flashbulb’ memories, that is memories of experiencing or learning of a particularly shocking or traumatic event. (The very description ‘flashbulb’ memory is in fact misleading, reflecting as it does the misconception that memory operates like a camera or other device that makes a fixed record of an experience.) External information can intrude into a witness’s memory, as can his or her own thoughts and beliefs, and both can cause dramatic changes in recollection. Events can come to be recalled as memories which did not happen at all or which happened to someone else (referred to in the literature as a failure of source memory).
 
18. Memory is especially unreliable when it comes to recalling past beliefs. Our memories of past beliefs are revised to make them more consistent with our present beliefs. Studies have also shown that memory is particularly vulnerable to interference and alteration when a person is presented with new information or suggestions about an event in circumstances where his or her memory of it is already weak due to the passage of time.
 
19. The process of civil litigation itself subjects the memories of witnesses to powerful biases. The nature of litigation is such that witnesses often have a stake in a particular version of events. This is obvious where the witness is a party or has a tie of loyalty (such as an employment relationship) to a party to the proceedings. Other, more subtle influences include allegiances created by the process of preparing a witness statement and of coming to court to give evidence for one side in the dispute. A desire to assist, or at least not to prejudice, the party who has called the witness or that party’s lawyers, as well as a natural desire to give a good impression in a public forum, can be significant motivating forces.
 
20. Considerable interference with memory is also introduced in civil litigation by the procedure of preparing for trial. A witness is asked to make a statement, often (as in the present case) when a long time has already elapsed since the relevant events. The statement is usually drafted for the witness by a lawyer who is inevitably conscious of the significance for the issues in the case of what the witness does nor does not say. The statement is made after the witness’s memory has been “refreshed” by reading documents. The documents considered often include statements of case and other argumentative material as well as documents which the witness did not see at the time or which came into existence after the events which he or she is being asked to recall. The statement may go through several iterations before it is finalised. Then, usually months later, the witness will be asked to re-read his or her statement and review documents again before giving evidence in court. The effect of this process is to establish in the mind of the witness the matters recorded in his or her own statement and other written material, whether they be true or false, and to cause the witness’s memory of events to be based increasingly on this material and later interpretations of it rather than on the original experience of the events.
 
21. It is not uncommon (and the present case was no exception) for witnesses to be asked in cross-examination if they understand the difference between recollection and reconstruction or whether their evidence is a genuine recollection or a reconstruction of events. Such questions are misguided in at least two ways. First, they erroneously presuppose that there is a clear distinction between recollection and reconstruction, when all remembering of distant events involves reconstructive processes. Second, such questions disregard the fact that such processes are largely unconscious and that the strength, vividness and apparent authenticity of memories is not a reliable measure of their truth.
 
22. In the light of these considerations, the best approach for a judge to adopt in the trial of a commercial case is, in my view, to place little if any reliance at all on witnesses’ recollections of what was said in meetings and conversations, and to base factual findings on inferences drawn from the documentary evidence and known or probable facts. This does not mean that oral testimony serves no useful purpose – though its utility is often disproportionate to its length. But its value lies largely, as I see it, in the opportunity which cross-examination affords to subject the documentary record to critical scrutiny and to gauge the personality, motivations and working practices of a witness, rather than in testimony of what the witness recalls of particular conversations and events. Above all, it is important to avoid the fallacy of supposing that, because a witness has confidence in his or her recollection and is honest, evidence based on that recollection provides any reliable guide to the truth.”

Of course a good witness will not always win the day any more than a bad witness will necessarily always lose the case for the party calling them.  Lessons can though be learned and remembered from Saeed, not forgetting the Judge’s ultimate conclusion on the evidence he heard requiring him to acknowledge at paragraph 20 of the Judgment:

“…the actual unreliability of almost everyone who gave oral evidence (the exception being D2, but she had almost no actual involvement or relevant knowledge).”

 

Reliance on other party’s statements

We recently reported on the authority of UK Insurance Ltd v Stuart John Gentry [2018] EWHC 37 (QB)  dealing with the issue of what adverse inferences could be drawn from the absence of (what might be seen as) material witnesses.

The Court of Appeal had cause to consider an adjunct to this question earlier this month when they handed down judgment in Property Alliance Group Ltd v The Royal Bank of Scotland Plc [2018] EWCA Civ 355.  The facts of the case are not important to this article but the comments towards the end of the Court of Appeal’s judgment on whether a party can rely on a statement served by the other side where that witness has not been called to give evidence are.

Before addressing that it is fair to note that the Court of Appeal did, albeit briefly, comment on the absence of material witnesses when it said:

  1. No litigant is obliged to call witnesses to satisfy the curiosity or enthusiasm of his opponent. It was always open to PAG to subpoena any witness it thought would be helpful to the Court. The fact that a party who might be expected to produce witnesses does not do so may sometimes speak volumes but it is a matter for the Judge to decide whether it does so in a particular case. The critical question in the present case was whether manipulation of GBP LIBOR had taken place. The critical witness for that purpose was Mr Thomasson. If he was believed, there was nothing relevant for senior management to know; if he was not, RBS’s case collapsed anyway. The Judge did say (paragraph 461) that RBS’s decision not to call Mr Cummins (and a Mr Nielsen) in connection with the allegations of lowballing did not reflect well on RBS and repeated this in her decision on whether RBS had been fraudulent (paragraph 485). She was well aware of Mr Lord’s case (paragraph 479) but in the end was not prepared to draw an adverse inference. We do not think the Judge can be criticised.

Turning back to the potential reliance on the witness statements of those not called to give evidence, the Civil Procedure Rules seemingly makes the position clear at 32.5(5):

“(1) If –

(a) a party has served a witness statement; and

(b) he wishes to rely at trial on the evidence of the witness who made the statement,

he must call the witness to give oral evidence unless the court orders otherwise or he puts the statement in as hearsay evidence.

(5) If a party who has served a witness statement does not–

(a) call the witness to give evidence at trial; or

(b) put the witness statement in as hearsay evidence, any other party may put the witness statement in as hearsay evidence.”

The Court considered previous authority on this point, in particular McPhilemy v Times Newspapers Ltd (No. 2) [2000] 1 WLR 1732, and in an admirably clear pronouncement concluded:

  1. In our view, CPR 32.5 is not applicable where a party wishes to put in only part of a witness statement. The rule itself refers to “the witness statement” being admitted, not merely some of it. Further, it makes sense that a party wanting to rely on something said in a statement should have to place all of the statement before the Court. A Court asked to attach significance to a passage from a statement should have before it the totality of what the witness said. There would otherwise, as the Judge noted in paragraph 296 of her judgment, be “real concern that cherry picking out of context would arise”. It would, moreover, be odd if a party were free to contend for the reliability of what the witness said in a particular passage while withholding the balance of the statement because he disputed it. That, in fact, would seem to have been the position in the present case had the Judge acceded to PAG’s application. PAG, we gather, was unwilling to put in Mr Sefton’s witness statement in its entirety because most of what he said was adverse to its case. It follows that, in our view, the Judge was correct to refuse PAG’s application.

It may be that in housing fraud trials less attention is paid to the content of trial bundles in the context of those witnesses not being called, and certainly proper legal analysis of the status of such evidence is rarely entered into, but this case highlights both the basic rules applicable and their proper application and may prove significant in the “right” case.

Absence of material witnesses

In December 2017 the High Court had cause to consider a claim by an insurance company for damages based on the assertion that the Defendant had fraudulently represented to them that his car had been in collision with another vehicle driven by  someone who they insured. Mr Justice Teare handed down judgment in UK Insurance Ltd v Stuart John Gentry [2018] EWHC 37 (QB)  on 18 January 2018 and awarded the Claimant damages of £19,179 in addition to interest and costs.

One of the most interesting aspects of the judgment was a reminder of the court’s approach to “missing” witnesses, and at paragraph 68 the Judge noted:

“Mr. Grant on behalf of the Claimant invited the Court to draw adverse inferences from the failure of Mr. Gentry to give evidence (or to call evidence from Mr. Miller, Mr. Ebbs, and Mr. Toms). The circumstances in which inferences may be drawn have been summarised by the Court of Appeal in Wisnewski v Central Manchester Health Authority [1998] PIQR P324 at p.14 in these terms:
“(1) In certain circumstances a court may be entitled to draw adverse inferences from the absence or silence of a witness who might be expected to have material evidence to give on an issue in an action.
(2) If a court is willing to draw such inferences, they may go to strengthen the evidence adduced on that issue by the other party or to weaken the evidence, if any, adduced by the party who might reasonably have been expected to call the witness.
(3) There must, however, have been some evidence, however weak, adduced by the former on the matter in question before the court is entitled to draw the desired inference: in other words, there must be a case to answer on that issue.
(4) If the reason for the witness’s absence or silence satisfies the court, then no such adverse inference may be drawn. If, on the other hand, there is some credible explanation given, even if it is not wholly satisfactory, the potentially detrimental effect of his/her absence or silence may be reduced or nullified.””

To give one example of how this might operate in a housing context, consider a possession claim where the landlord seeks to show that the tenant did not live at the demised premises as their only or principal home at the expiry of a notice to quit.  They have credit reference evidence linking the tenant to an alternative address which proves to be their partner’s.  The tenant does not call this person to give evidence, or they do not attend trial.

The two-stage approach will then be:

(a) why has the partner not been called or not attended trial?

(b) if there is no good reason, should the court draw an adverse inference such as to diminish the defendant’s evidence or bolster that of the claimant?

Finally, as part of the evidential overview, the importance of the Court of Appeal decisions in Lambeth LBC v Vandra [2005] 1801 (see paragraph 8 concerning the absence of direct evidence) and Islington LBC v Boyle [2012] PTSR 1093 (see paragraphs 55 & 65 with respect to the need for the tenant to rebut an inference in two homes cases) should not be overlooked.