Safeguards are needed against the abuse of private prosecutions, the Post Office scandal shows

Reforms should be made to guard against an inevitable conflict of interest, the Bar Council chair argues

Before the latest Post Office headlines swept across the country, I expect very few people were aware that the law allows any adult, or organisation, to bring a private prosecution. In light of the Horizon scandal, the next question must surely be: how do we guard against abuse?

The Bar Council, representing almost 18,000 barristers in England and Wales, last week called for parliament to review the safeguards associated with private prosecutions. The Post Office Horizon scandal is one of the worst miscarriages of justice our country has seen and focus rightly turns to the circumstances in which the private prosecutions were brought.

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from The Guardian https://ift.tt/KEXDIR4

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