Report and Recommendations - Scottish Government

more persuasive than a multiplicity of witnesses. The obvious example iswhen the judge or jury is considering the testimony of a single independent orimpartial eye-witness, whose character cannot be impugned, as distinct fromlistening to members of a rival gang in a street fight or feuding neighbours in apublic order debacle.7.2.44 A third argument is that requirement for corroboration is frequentlymisunderstood by lay persons and lawyers, not least judges. It is an artificialbar to prosecution and conviction because of its restrictive method of lookingat the quantity of the evidence without reference to its quality. The system isskewed by prioritising quantity over quality.7.2.45 As outlined above, elaborate legal theories, unique to Scotland, have beendevised over recent years in an attempt to fit an archaic requirement intotoday’s reality. These have included the division of facts into differentcategories, viz.: crucial or essential, evidential and procedural so that only theformer require to be corroborated. They include the idea that distress iscorroborative of the use of force or a lack of consent in sexual offences. Thisis not only difficult to explain clearly to a jury in the context of a real case, itis highly doubtful whether a jury, even with its collective intelligence, canfully grasp the legal nuances of the judge’s directions.7.2.46 The application of the principle in Moorov is yet another example of where thelaw has become stretched. It becomes highly artificial where the events are280