Permission for judicial review granted in the case of Ben Geen
Mark McDonald and Stephen Knight have successfully obtained permission to judicially review the decision of the Criminal Cases Review Commission, which refused to refer the case of Ben Geen to the Court of Appeal.
The case of Ben Geen is seen by many in the medical and statistical communities as a tragic miscarriage of justice. The campaign to free Mr Geen has been reported on by media outlets including The Justice Gap and The Guardian. It has been likened by many to the miscarriage of justice in the case of Lucia de Berk, a Dutch paediatric nurse who spent six years of a life sentence in jail for murdering seven people before being released.
Ben Geen, fighting for freedom.
Yesterday, Mr Justice Gilbart in the High Court held that it was arguable that there were a series of failings by the Criminal Cases Review Commission when they considered Ben Geen's application for the review of his convictions. A number of leading statisticians and doctors had provided expert reports demonstrating that the case brought at trial was based on unreliable evidence as to the rarity of "primary respiratory arrest". The application for judicial review argues that the CCRC had completely failed to properly consider any of this new evidence, instead dismissing much of it out of hand and completely failing to understand the rest.
Many of the documents put forward by the defence for the appeal are available on the website of Justice for Ben Geen.
The case will now be listed for a full hearing before the High Court.