Victim of Misidentification Charged With 13 Offences Acquitted Thanks to our Solicitors

In April 2020 Stuart Miller Solicitors’ client Mr K was charged and received a 13-count indictment including fraud, attempting to commit fraud by false representation, theft and burglary. Mr K maintained throughout his case that the Crown Prosecution Services and Police had misidentified him as the perpetrator of these crimes.

Mr K was charged at Peterborough Magistrates Court two years after the allegations were made against him. The case was then brought before the Cambridge Crown Court.

The Crown Prosecution Service alleged that Mr K was involved in a stream of offences that occurred between the 28th of August and the 28th of October 2019.

They purported that Mr K, along with his Co-Defendant, committed a series of burglaries in the county of Cambridgeshire where credit cards were stolen. Those credit cards were then allegedly used to withdraw money totalling £4,910.

Mr K instructed Stuart Miller Solicitor’s Sophie Lalaoui that he was employed throughout this period. He could not have been at the locations of the committed offences on the dates the CPS and police claimed.

In order to demonstrate and maintain the innocence of Mr K and his case, Sophie Lalaoui provided indisputable evidence to the court.

Evidence of Mr K’s bank statements between August and October 2019 was obtained. These statements showed that transactions were made at the time the offences were committed in South East London by the defendant. It was clear that he was not present at the location where the alleged crimes were committed.

Mr K’s previous employer, CPR Recruitment based in Maidstone, provided evidence of an employee time sheet. This evidence established that Mr K was signed in and working in Greenwich, South East London on the 28th of August, the time the offence was committed.

Stuart Miller’s expert solicitor made disclosure requests to the prosecution which unearthed cell site data the prosecution had withheld as “unused material”. This “unused material” showed Mr K’s telephone was in Greenwich in August and Guilford in October, at the time of the alleged offences.

A spokesperson for the firm stated:

“It was just impossible for Mr. K to be at work in Greenwich while also committing two separate offences in Herefordshire on the 28th of August 2019.”

Thanks to the tireless dedication and work of Stuart Miller Solicitors expert serious crime and fraud solicitor, Sophie Lalaoui, Mr K was acquitted after the Crown Prosecution Service offered no evidence against him.