Report and Recommendations - Scottish Government

wrong. A witness can be unreliable, even if manifestly credible. In particular,eye-witness identification evidence is often regarded as being potentiallyunreliable 69 . It must therefore be recognised immediately and clearly that it isquite possible for a judge or jury simply to err in the assessment of a singlewitness 70 .7.2.38 The requirement for corroboration can only prevent a miscarriage of justiceoccurring in cases where there is only a single witness providing incriminatingevidence of the commission of the crime or the identity of the perpetrator. Itcannot do so in the many cases where there is a technical sufficiency.Theoretically, all miscarriage cases identified after the appeal process has beencompleted in Scotland ought to have had such a technical sufficiency sinceotherwise the trial judge ought to have sustained a no case to answersubmission or, if he/she erred in that regard, the conviction ought to have beenquashed on appeal.7.2.39 The requirement must, at least in theory, prevent miscarriages occurring in thesingle witness situation as, almost by definition, it eliminates that category ofcase. As Lord Morris said in the context of a case requiring corroboration ofchild evidence in England 71 :“Any risk of the conviction of an innocent person is lessened ifconviction is based upon the testimony of more than one acceptablewitness. Corroborative evidence in the sense of some other materialevidence in support implicating the accused furnishes a safeguardwhich makes a conclusion more sure than it would be without suchevidence”.69 Identification Procedure under Scottish Criminal Law (the Bryden Report) Cmnd 7096 (1978)70 Macphail: Revised Research Paper on Evidence para 23.02 under reference to “Anon:“Corroboration of Evidence in Scottish Criminal Law” 1958 SLT (news) 13771 DPP v Hester [1973] AC 296 at 315277