Wednesday, 14th January 1998
SUMMING-UP (Continued) Page 4

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Steele had got an immersion suit he had hired that day. I wore a wet suit." He said as to sailing ability, "Corry was not as competent as me or Mick. He was not a beginner. He was not nervous or shaky. The GPS wasn't on. The stretch of river from Felixstowe to the sea is extremely busy. We crossed the Thames estuary, which is an extremely busy waterway. There are strong tides. There are probably shifting sandbanks. You can travel parallel to the coast up and down. If a boat has uncertain reliability you take it on a long trip. I had my mobile with me.

The Mariah is worse for shipping water. I placed my mobile phone in the pocket. I don't know if Steele had his mobile. I don't think we dropped in on Gordon Stevens before we started the trip, but I think Gordon was about and saw us go. Gordon Stevens rang my mobile phone when I was on the way back. It might have been just before getting to the river. The conversation was about diesel fuel. I asked him about getting me an older-type juke box for 45s and 78s. There was trouble with the boat by the time he phoned. I didn't tell him that or where we were. He telephoned at 20 to 12 and I probably did say yes, I was out there. I remember the phone ringing twice and I spoke to Gordon longer than the other call when I spoke to Darren." "When we got back I had dry clothes in the Range Rover and I changed in Gordon's. I can't remember if Gordon expressed concern over us being away for so long.

I was aware of the headlights outside. I had conversation with police officers, telling them who owns the boat and where I'd just come from. I told him about the fuel trouble and that we were stuck on a shingle bank." Mr Lederman asked Whomes at that stage if the police had asked him who was in the boat. Whomes's answer was, "No, I don't think he asked me." You remember the evidence of PC Crick about that. "He asked me where I'd been and I said I'd been sitting round Gordon's. That was what the police officer asked me. He was a conversational chap. The extra fuel tank was removed to clean the petrol up which was lying round." Then the conversation which the police officer spoke of was put by Mr Munday to Mr Whomes. Mr Whomes said, "I didn't tell the officer that I'd been out in a boat that I owned. I'd been with my brother, John, and Gordon Stevens. I didn't say that diving at night was all right because the water wasn't clear anyway. I didn't say my brother had left with the wet suits ten minutes ago in a white Peugeot.

What the PC has put together is what he got from the conversation and there is a perfectly simple explanation that I gave to that officer." Then he was asked about questions that he was asked on that occasion and he said, "When I was asked questions I understood what the caution was. I had the opportunity to speak to a solicitor. The officer's explanation was clear. I fully understood what my position was. I knew I'd done nothing wrong. I'd had a reasonable sleep but not as comfortable as in a bed. I could have answered questions." He is talking about the 8th November. "I could have told them that it was nonsense that my brother was on the boat. I could have explained then that I hadn't told the officer that John was there on the boat and that he was not there, but I didn't. I didn't say anything because I was told to say, 'No comment,' and that was legal advice.

I could have told the police officer what I've said in this court." Then it was put to him that he had stayed silent in that interview because what he told the jury -- you -- was not the truth and he had not worked it out then. He was asked about the call at 4.3, page 10, call 338 at 19.6 on the 7th November. He said, "When that call was made I don't remember where I was; somewhere around the destination and probably on the way back. Nicholls was a quick phone call. I said I was busy now, 'I'll ring you back later.' I didn't say where I was and he didn't say what he wanted. It was Darren's voice at 19.46. I remember Darren anyway. The call got through and I heard his voice. It was not his wife. What would she ring me for? It was not for her to pass on a message to me from Darren. She did ring me once on the day after I was arrested and I might have rung her." He was asked about the calls "on the 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th November and he was asked to look at the fourth extract. He said at 14.42 there was a call to Tate and at 14.47 a call to him. "The call at 10.43 on the 7th could be about going out on the boat. The call at 13.43 shows that Steele has not yet arrived and I used my Vodaphone to phone him. There were no calls on my phone until my release from the police station on the 8th.

There were no calls between 2.21 on the 7th and 8.35 pm on the next day. I couldn't phone after the phone was taken from me by the police." He said, "I didn't meet the RIB as it brought in cannabis at Point Clear. I didn't drive round on the roads to Felixstowe ferry where I met it again. All the cannabis hadn't been removed. There was no cannabis. It's not true that I gave the no comment answers because I hadn't had a chance to cook up my story." He said between the release from the police station on the 8th November and the Ostend trip he did speak to Barren Nicholls at Meadow Cottage mainly. Darren rang him if he wanted to pick his brains over a vehicle. Barren never sought to involve him in anything illegal. He never asked him to take part in any drug runs. "He knows I wouldn't do it. Between those dates he never complained to me about Tate. I didn't know he was in contact with Tate. Steele didn't tell me of Nicholls's relationship with Tate. I don't think I would remember. I can't see any interest." "On the 16th November I went out to Ostend to help. When I got there I was told it was to do with Tate. Tate was supposed to be coming over and collecting some money. He said he had already phoned Customs and Excise three or four times to get the RIB back.

Scarlett checked the ferry times. Gordon didn't do nothing. So if I said I asked him to check the ferry times then that would be a slip. I didn't ask what money. I didn't ask why didn't he do it himself. He didn't say what currency or what amount. I didn't ask who else was going to go. I didn't ask why it couldn't be paid into a bank and sent back that way. I did ask if it was above board and he assured me it was legal money and not funny money. My only concern was whether it was counterfeit. Steele said it was on behalf of Nicholls. I thought on that I was taking back legal money. I found out I could take back about 15,000. I didn't question him at all. I got the first available ferry. I think it was about the 8 pm ferry. I was in the transit and I think it was a commercial ticket Scarlett got for me. I went to Ostend and met Steele and Nicholls, spent 15 minutes to half an hour in their company. It was three hours per channel port and the crossing was one and a half hours." He agreed it was a total of about 12 hours: five and a half hours out, half an hour there and five and a half hours back.

He said he had spent 12 hours, probably more, on an errand of help for Nicholls to help out a friend. "I didn't ask them any more about where the money came from or what it was in relation to. It wasn't my business. It was said that Tate was coming over but I wasn't told he was already there." "I discussed it when I got home. I said I wanted £200 and the cash for my fare and Darren paid it in cash. I didn't know what I was given was more than £15,000. I didn't know it was no more than £15,000. I took it on trust. I told him I would only take £15,000 and I understood that's what he gave me." "If it had been asked on the 17th November what Tate's role in all this was, I would have said something to do with Darren and Tate was in the same position as me. I was a courier of legal money." He was asked about the fifth extract and agreed his call to Jackie Steele (sic) on the 16th at 18.17 was one in which Jackie Steele (sic) may have mentioned Mick Steele and may have told him Mick Steele was in Ostend. He said, "I probably did know the day before. It can't have been a surprise to me." He said in a conversation with Darren Nicholls at Meadow Cottage he never asked Darren Nicholls where the money came from until his arrest in May.

He did not give any thought to his trip to Ostend that he had made. He did not discuss it with anyone. He retained contact with Steele and with Darren Nicholls. He was asked about the calls in late. November and early December. He said after his return from Ostend he was in almost daily contact with Steele and was at Meadow Cottage on Sunday, 3rd November and they probably spoke to each other. He spoke of calling at his uncle's house. On the 4th December Dennis had picked his Citroen up. Whomes told Dennis Whomes that on that night he would come down and pick up the trailer tomorrow. It was the 5th he had planned to pick the trailer up. His journey to Bulphan was about 120 miles to Bulphan and 120 miles back. He knocked on the door and went round the back. He said he shouted through the letter box, and then he was shown Exhibit 301. He agreed the letter box was not on the door. It was on the wall in that photograph.

He said his uncle could have changed the door. He left a note and drove back to Mick's and phoned Mick to tell him that he did not get the trailer and he would call in. He agreed that meant a diversion off the direct road and he said, "To have a long chat man to man is better than talking on the phone." He said there was no reason for Mick to tell Nicholls that he was going to Bulphan and he, Whomes, did not tell Nicholls that. He had never been to the Halfway House but had driven past it. He said the thought of phoning Mick only came into his head as he drove along the road. He could have phone from his uncle's house but 20 minutes had past, probably. It was put to him this was a dry run or a rehearsal and he said it was not. "I didn't phone my uncle to say, 'Where are you, Dennis?' I didn't think to make sure I'd be able to get the trailer the next day. There was nothing to prevent me from telephoning Dennis from Mr Steele's. I could have telephoned my mother, my brother Johnny or Terry to get my uncle's number but I didn't try any one of them." He said on the 6th he first finished his work at the docks and then went back to the yard and loaded a tractor onto his trailer and travelled from Barham to Aingers Green, which took about 45 minutes. It was dark when he arrived.

Then he was asked a question. He is being asked about when he arrived at Aingers Green when it is dark, and he said it was either four o'clock in the afternoon or just before. He was asked, "At that time, as you are going, what are your plans? If someone had said to you, 'Jack, where are you going? How are you going to spend the rest of the day?' what would you have said? His answer was, "Take a tractor to Mick's and going to pick the trailer up at Dennis's." Of course, that was not what his plans were, according to the evidence he had given to you about that day. After taking the tractor to Mick's he was not going to pick up the trailer at Dennis's, he was going to pick up the Passat at the car park at the pub, the Wheatsheaf. Whomes corrected that mistake by saying, "I've messed up part of my story. You was rushing me, Mr Munday. I've not forgotten something which I've cooked up with Mr Steele." Mr Munday was putting that he had left out everything about Colin Bridge's coming to see him and about the change of plan and had given a contrary explanation. Mr Whomes then corrected himself as to what his plans were at the time to include the picking up of the Passat. He told you about Col in Bridge's arrival at the yard and Bridge's evidence that he had not been to Whomes's address.

That he could guarantee. He said Bridges was lying. He has been to the yard before. He agreed he did not say to Bridge, "Why me? Why not the AA?" He did not say, "What's in it for me?" He told him he could not borrow the trailer but he, Whomes, would pick it up. He said, "Tell me where it is and I'll go and collect it." He denied that he had invented Colin Bridge going away and coming back to cover the phone calls from the Sorell Horse. He then described how he had got the vehicle and, speaking of the phone call at 18.59, he said, "I telephoned Darren to tell him I'd got the vehicle and to make sure it was his." You know the length of the calls at 18.59, members of the jury, one of four seconds, but that is what he was saying was the content of the call. "I only decided to check after I'd got it, the Passat." He agreed he phoned O'Connor on the 7th December at 21.32 on page 67. He said that call was to find out where Peter Ainger was and not to say he was going to bring the Passat round to Mr O'Connor. "Nicholls had said I should get rid of it, lose the vehicle, and he would claim on insurance." As to the directions for Bulphan, he said, "I gave directions to Steele face to face. I didn't refer to the map.

Steele doesn't handle and use maps. I was confident I'd given sufficient explanation to find that trailer." He said the first time he told Mick Steele about the change of plan about going for Darren to pick up the Passat at the Wheatsheaf was four o'clock and it was dark. You may want to compare that account with the account given by Jackie Street in her statement. He said he did not know where Rettendon was until he was arrested. He did see the coverage on television but he did not take any notice so it did not register. He was asked about questions that he was asked when interviewed after his arrest and he agreed that he could have answered all those questions. Those included the questions in Exhibit 302(a) at pages, for instance, 41, 43 and 45 and all the other pages. He said, "As to the Ostend trip, I could have answered that I went out and collected the money. I was duped." As to 46, question 13, "I knew Nicholls was implicating me in these matters but my mind was racing and in overdrive. I was told what his allegations were and I could have answered by far the majority of the allegations made against me.

I didn't use the allegation of own incompetence," which you will remember he mentioned, "as an excuse. It wasn't that I hadn't invented my story yet. My trip in the afternoon of the 6th wasn't to collect guns." In re-examination to Mr Lederman, he said, "I knew my way about fairly well. If someone said to me, 'There is a vehicle at Bures,' I would know how to get there. I would work it out if I'd been that way before." "On the 5th December I went back from Dennis Whomes's a different way from the way I came." On the 7th December there was an accident at work, and he gave you the details of it. He said he got to work by 7.30 and the accident was about 2 pm. You will remember that Scarlett Edgar had told you about that accident and how well Mr Whomes had performed in the accident and in solving the problem. He said as to the Ostend money, "I don't think I connected the money with cannabis." Finally, he said he had used the radios in the water activities on the beach that the family did, including parascending, and you saw the photographs, Exhibit 303, which show the radio equipment in the hands of people having sporting activities on the beach.

Just two more little bits of evidence, members of the jury, and then we have finished the evidence in the case until I come to deal with some directions of law which I will give you after the adjournment. Kevin Stevens, you remember, was the publican at the Ferry Boat Inn at Felixstowe. He remembered an incident late at night in 1995 when he and customers noticed car lats on the sea wall and walked over to see what the problem was and saw Jack Whomes was over there. He was trying to stop Gordon Stevens's boat from sinking. Gordon called the fire brigade, who came. They were pumping the boat out and the pump jammed and Whomes freed it. The incident finished in the early hours of the morning at 2 am, or maybe later. The last witness, members of the jury, was Mr Hillman. For his evidence you will need exhibit 304, his photographs, which are at the back of the defence file, 128. His evidence relates to Rectory Lane at Rettendon and is connected with the evidence of Mr Jasper. Mr Hillman was the investigator who went on the 26th November of 1997 to Rectory Lane at Rettendon and took the photographs.

Photograph 3 is opposite photograph 2. 4 and 5 go together, as do 6 and 7. He indicated the positions on the plan as to where these photographs were taken. He said photograph 8 was just behind the L-shaped block. The marks on the plan are all buildings and those that were habitations were all inhabited. The first part of the lane was nearly all houses. He did not get close enough to Mate's Farm (sic) to know if it was a working farm. Members of the jury, that is all the evidence in the case which is relevant for your purposes. After the adjournment I shall give you certain directions of law, for the purposes of which I shall have to get you to look at Exhibit 203(a), the May 1996 questions that were asked of Steele, and Exhibit 302(a), questions at the same time in May of 1996 that were asked of Whomes. Once I give you those directions, because we are now going to be into the afternoon, I will break off and will send you home because there is another matter I have to deal with before I finally send you out.

What I shall save is about 20 minutes to half an hour tomorrow morning so that you will be able to get out to your retirement very early on in the morning. That, I think, is more desirable than to send you out at some uncertain time this afternoon because I have to deal with the other matter between now and finishing the summing-up to you. I have to give counsel an opportunity to comment, if they wish to, on anything I have said. They have been dutifully totally silent for the last seven days, six and a half days, and I have to give them that opportunity, and that is really why I cannot think of sending you out today. But whatever happens this afternoon, I think I can fairly confidently say that it will be half an hour or so tomorrow morning then you will retire. Thank you. 2.15, members of the jury.

(Luncheon adjournment).

MR JUSTICE HIDDEN: We shall come in a moment, members of the jury, to directions of law when, of course, you have to take the law from me and accept it and follow it. The same is not, of course, the position with the evidence which I have been dealing with for days. I have finished dealing with the evidence in relation to the case against the defendant, Steele, and this morning I finished dealing with the case in relation to Whomes. I come, of course, now to the case of Peter Corry. He stands in a very different position from the other two defendants because of course he is not charged with any of the three counts of murder. He is charged only in the first count, the conspiracy to import cannabis resin. In relation to his case, I can sum that up in just a matter of minutes because, of course, you have before you only the evidence of the interview with him which took place at 17.06 on the 8th November 1995, and the one that followed ten minutes later at 17.16, Exhibits 149 and 150. I read those to you at the earlier stage in the evidence given by the prosecution and in particular the evidence of Mr Bragg.

What I shall take you to now, very shortly and very simply, are the admissions that exist in the case of Peter Corry. Now I hope you have four separate pages dealing with the admissions in this case. Mine are put after flag 9 in the interviews file. I do not know if yours are in the same place. Perhaps we can check at this moment that you have all four. The one I am dealing with at the moment is a short document with five numbers on it, dealing only with, it says at the top, the case of R v Peter Corry. It looks like that. I will go through it in a moment but let me just check that you equally have the other three pages. They are headed Admissions, Agreed Facts and Further Agreed Facts. Yes, I am glad. Let me ask you to concentrate at the moment on the admissions in the case of Peter Corry. It is admitted that Peter Corry can be treated as a man of good character. He has two children, aged 15 and 23 respectively. There is no record of any telephone call between Peter Corry and Darren Nicholls, or between Peter Corry and Francis Reid. Number 4 is that between the 4th September and the 28th December 1995 telephones registered to Darren Nicholls called Francis Reid's landline telephone on 92 occasions.

The number is 92. You may remember, it would be surprising if you did, that that is not the figure that was put to Nicholls when he was cross-examined by Mr Rees. At the time the figure being put was 164. It obviously was not the right figure but Nicholls said that that was all right, he could not dispute it. The right figure is 92 occasions and the dates of the 4th September to the 28th December, give or take three days at each end, are the four months of September, October, November and December. 92 occasions on four calendar months which, if my maths is right, is an average of 23 a month. Admission 5, Francis Reid was visited by police officers on the 17th June 1996. He refused to make a witness statement. He was not arrested. The only other evidence given was that of the interview. I have read it before, but I will draw your attention in a moment, if I may, to specific aspects of it. Let me deal with the question of good character. You have heard that the defendant, Peter Corry, is a man of good character.

I now give you a direction in law as to how you should treat that matter. The direction is this: Of course good character cannot by itself provide a defence to a criminal charge but it is evidence which you should take into account in his favour in the following ways: In the first place although the defendant has chosen not to give evidence before you, he did, as you know, give an explanation to the Customs on the 8th November 1995. In considering that explanation and what weight you should give it, you should bear in mind that it was made by a person of good character and take that into account in deciding whether you can believe it. Now you know, of course, that the defendant, Corry, did not give evidence before you. There is a direction in law that I have to give you in relation to that. That direction is this: The defendant has not given evidence. That is his right because, as I told you at the beginning of the summing-up, he is entitled to remain silent and require the prosecution to prove its case. You must not assume he is guilty just because he has not given evidence because failure to give evidence cannot on its own prove guilt.

However, as he has been told, and you heard him being told it in this court when the moment came that he could have given evidence, as he has been told, depending on the circumstances you may take into account his failure to give evidence when deciding on your verdict. In the first place, when considering the evidence as it now is you may bear in mind that there is no evidence from the defendant, Corry, himself which in any way undermines or contradicts or explains the evidence put before you by the prosecution. The defendant did answer questions in interview. He now seeks to rely on those answers which are, of course, evidence in the case, evidence of what he said then. It is a matter for you to decide what weight you should give to them but you are entitled to bear in mind that those answers were not given here before you.

They were not given on oath and the prosecution has had no opportunity to test them before you in cross-examination. In the second place, if you think in all the circumstances it is right so to do, you are entitled when deciding whether the defendant is guilt of Count 1 to draw such inferences from his failure to give evidence as you think proper. What inference can you properly draw from the defendant, Corry's, decision not to give evidence before you? The answer is that if you conclude there is a case for him to meet, you may think that if he had an answer to it he would have gone into the witness box to tell you what it was. If, in your judgment, the only sensible reason for his decision not to give evidence is that he has no explanation or answer to give or none that would have stood up to cross-examination, then it would be open to you to hold against him his failure to give evidence and that means to take it into account as some additional support for the prosecution's case.

You are not bound to do so. It is for you to decide whether it is fair to do so. There is another legal direction I have to give you on this subject, both in relation to Corry and also in relation to Whomes, but before I do I have to identify the particular evidence that I am referring to. Would you turn in Corry's case to Exhibits 149 and 150, his two interviews on the 8th November 1995. I have identified those two interviews both to you and taken you through parts of them. I am only going to refer you at the moment to four particular passages and they relate to his answers to questions that involve what the purpose of using the RIB on the 7th and 8th November was. If you would turn in the earlier interview to the third page which has 165 at the bottom, level with the top punch hole, Corry says, "Well, you know, I just went out for testing it." On the next page at the second punch hole, "He put in a lot of work to it and he wanted to go out and test the computer on board." Again, the use of the word "testing" was the purpose of the voyage.

Further on at page 6, the bottom answer, "Well that's where we went and picked the boat up, then we went out to test it", and in the second interview, Exhibit 150, the second page of the interview with 172 at the bottom, by the first punch hole, Corry says, "We've been through all this. As far as I am concerned, I've spoken to you. I've admitted being on the boat for a pleasure trip round the bays. That's all I'm prepared to say." Those are four passages where in the first three Corry is answering the Customs Officer by saying it was a trip to do some testing, and in the last, in the second interview, saying it was a pleasure trip round the bays. Those are matters where it is alleged by the prosecution that he lied to the Customs Officer asking the questions, Mr Gray. The prosecution allege also that Mr Whomes told lies in this case to police officers asking him questions at Felixstowe ferry beach on the morning of the 8th November. There is no document for you to look at but it is again four answers that are said to be lies; two are to Mr Crick and one is alleged to be to Sergeant Long.

To Mr Crick, you will remember, he said he had been out diving with his brother, John Whomes, on that occasion. He also told Mr Crick, if Mr Crick be right, that his brother, again that would be John Whomes, had left about ten minutes ago, taking the wet suits in a white Peugeot. The prosecution allege it was a lie that he had been diving and that it was a lie that his brother had taken the wet suits off, and that was said to try to explain away the absence of wet suits on the boat. To Sergeant Long, he said, again on Felixstowe ferry beach, "We'd been fishing." When the officer asked about the absence of fishing gear on the boat, he said, "We've been pleasure boating." Those four matters are alleged to be lies. Now if you find them to be lies, only if, because matters of evidence are for you, what is the position in law in relation to Corry and Whomes? The direction I give you is this: It is alleged that the defendant lied to the police in Mr Corry's case in those four lies in the two interviews, 149 and 150 that I have identified, and in Mr Whomes's case in four different matters, two of which he spoke about to Mr Crick, the Police Constable, and two to Mr Long, the Police Sergeant.

You are entitled to consider whether this supports the case against him in this regard. You should consider two questions. First, you must decide whether what each defendant separately, Corry and Whomes, said was in fact a lie. If you are not sure that he said those matters in the case of Mr Whomes, ignore the matter. Equally, if you are not sure that when Mr Corry said those matters in his written interview they were lies, then again ignore the matter, but if you are sure that in each separate case Whomes did say those things and they were lies, and Corry did say those things and they were lies, then move on to the second matter and consider why did the defendant lie? The mere fact that a defendant tells a lie is not in itself evidence of guilt. A defendant may lie for many reasons; they may possibly be innocent ones in the sense they do not denote guilt. For example, they could be lies to bolster a true defence, to protect somebody else, out of panic or confusion. In this case, the explanation put forward is, in Mr Whomes's case, that he says that they are not lies, he did not say them in any event.

He says that they were not spoken by him, those words, and therefore cannot be taken to be lies as not having been made. In Mr Corry's case, the explanation put forward by his counsel is that they are not lies. If you are satisfied in either case they are lies, but you think that there is or may be an innocent explanation for the lies, then you should take no notice of them. It is only if you are sure that the defendant, the one or the other or both, did not lie for an innocent reason that his lies can be regarded by you as evidence going to prove guilt and supporting the prosecution case. That is the way you treat those matters which are said to be lies. There is one more direction of law allied to the ones I have already given you, but this one affects the defendants, Steele and Whomes. For this purpose I wonder if you would turn to 203(a) and 302(a), 203(a) being the series of interviews with Mr Whomes -- no, 203(a) is Mr Steele and 302 (a) is Mr Whomes. Let us do them in indictment order and do Mr Steele first, 203(a). I am not going to read out all these pages to you.

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