Report and Recommendations - Scottish Government

2.0.9 The retreat from Chalmers was never formally acknowledged by the court.But matters culminated in the Second Report of the Thomson Committee in1975. The Committee had been appointed in 1970 20 :“to examine trial and pretrial procedures in Scotland …for theprosecution of persons accused of crimes and offences and to reportwhether, having regard to the prevention of crime on the one hand andto the need for fairness on the other, any changes in law or practice arerequired.”2.0.10 In its Second Report, the Committee identified what it regarded as the generalproblem. This it described as the conflict between the public interest in thedetection and suppression of crime on the one hand and the interest of theindividual citizen in freedom from interference by the police on the other. Itquoted the Lord Justice General (Cooper) in Lawrie v Milne 21 where, insteadof looking at admissibility as one of principle as he later did in Chalmers, hestressed the need for the law to 22 :“strive to reconcile two highly important interests which are liable tocome into conflict – (a) the interest of the citizen to be protected fromillegal or irregular invasions of his liberties by the authorities, and (b)the interest of the state to secure that evidence bearing upon thecommission of crime and necessary to enable justice to be done shallnot be withheld from courts of law on any merely formal or technicalground”.2.0.11 At the time of the Report, the courts were still looking at the admissibility of20 at para 1.0121 1950 JC 1922 at p 26statements by suspects, as distinct from those from persons formally arrestedand charged, from the perspective of “fairness”; that is to say, if the statementswere regarded as “fairly obtained”, then it was admissible. Fairness came to29