Man charged with sexual abuse of niece found Not Guilty

Case study summary

Our client was accused of performing sexual acts with his 8-year-old niece while she slept. The prosecution ignored their own evidence which showed that he had attended her room to check on her health. We used this evidence to persuade the jury, who then found him Not Guilty.

Case study

Our client faced a trial at Bradford Crown Court, and was accused of performing sexual acts with his 8-year-old niece. He faced a long prison sentence if convicted. He came to us having had a different firm of solicitors during the police investigation. He had by now been charged and had the worrying prospect of a court date ahead of him. His confidence at this stage in the justice system was at a low.

The prosecution served evidence from the complainant and her family members, to damage our client's character in court. At the same time, they ignored evidence which would have known cast doubt on their own case.

It was well known that the complainant suffered from diabetes, and that she would often become confused when having a hyperglycaemic incident. She was fitted with a monitor that set off an alert on an app on her mother's phone when this happened.

The complainant had been staying with our client and his girlfriend at his address. She stated that she was awoken by our client in the middle of the night and sexually abused by him. Our client denied this. He stated that he heard the diabetic alert and had gone in to check on his niece.

This was disputed by both the complainant and her mother, who stated that she received no app alerts. Detailed analysis of hundreds of pages of telephone evidence showed that the complainant had experienced a ‘sugar spike’ and the app's alarm was activated, as our client had always claimed.

We prepared a full chronology of the events that night using the mobile app data. Our specially selected barrister was able to perform a devastatingly effective cross examination based on this information. This resulted in a rapid and unanimous not guilty verdict and our client was able to walk free from court and carry on with his life.