Ahmed v Police

Faisal Ahmed appealed against his conviction for male assaults female and resisting police, as well as the sentence imposed. The appeal was dismissed in relation to the conviction, but the sentence was allowed to be appealed. The court was required to determine whether Ahmed had grounds to appeal his conviction a second time, requiring leave under the Summary Proceedings Act 1957. The grounds proposed for the second appeal were that the police did not give full disclosure before Ahmed entered his guilty plea, CCTV footage was inadmissible because it had been altered, Ahmed did not resist arrest, self-defence was available as a defence, the police did not act according to law in terms of prosecuting the crime committed against him, Ahmed was not adequately represented by his counsel, Ahmed was coerced into pleading guilty in the hope of obtaining a discharge without conviction and misled by his counsel into thinking that would happen, although he had been granted leave to vacate his guilty plea Ahmed was not informed of this, there was a miscarriage of justice, and the impact of the conviction was still affecting his life.

The court considered the proposed grounds of appeal and found that none of them raised a question of law, let alone a question of law of such general or public importance as to warrant a second appeal. The court found that the proposed grounds had already been considered during the previous appeal or could not be effectively advanced because Ahmed had declined to waive privilege in respect of the advice he had received from his counsel. The court also found that the current assertion that the CCTV footage was altered did not raise a question of law. Therefore, leave was refused for the second appeal.