So you go to town on the bus, head to the shops and buy your mum a new kitchen knife, with cash, a 6’ blade, something Rick Stein would be proud to use. You walk out with the knife in its plastic packaging, a bag and a receipt, and you get the bus home and present it to mum. Have you committed a crime?  Of course not

But, let’s say, having left the store with the knife, you bump into a friend and go to the pub. Say you have a couple of beers and show your mate the knife, taking it out of the packaging, throwing the bag and packaging away. You leave the pub a little worse for wear, the knife now inside your backpack, and you’re making a bit of a fool of yourself, singing the latest Englebert Humperdinck stormer on the bus home. Somebody hates Englebert and calls the police who search you and find the knife. Have you committed a crime?  No, as you’re still taking it home having just bought it, but who’s to know that? The police don’t and you can’t prove you just bought it. You’re nicked and charged with Possession of a Bladed Instrument in a public place. Then you’re told that the Court sentence guidelines start at 6 months in prison.

You are not allowed to have such a knife or bladed instrument in public without reasonable excuse or lawful authority. So if you’re cooking at your girlfriend’s place and walking across the road to her’s and get stopped by the police, then that would be a reasonable excuse. If you’re a butcher and you’re taking your meat cleavers home for a deep clean, and you’re stopped on the way home, then that’s a reasonable excuse.  After police enquiries, of your girlfriend, or as to your employment, the police would likely release you with no further action.

It’s sometimes difficult to prove that you have a reasonable excuse to possess a knife in public. Life just isn’t always like that. I had a case recently where I represented a client who had been stopped late on a Friday night in his car. He was dropping his partner off at her home. The police had cause to search him and his vehicle, and found, locked in the boot, 3 knives, all over 3 inches long, near or inside a bag of work tools. Now my client was a car mechanic, he said, but he had no evidence of that in the car, apart from the presence of the tools. He wasn’t at work or going to work, or coming from work. Before I go further, items inside a locked car are legally in a public place, if the car is on a public road. Case law on Possession of a Bladed Instrument also states that if you are coming home from work with bladed items then you would have a reasonable excuse. The law requires you to take them from your car and keep them inside before taking them back with you when you leave for work again. But my client had not done that. He’s left his toolkit in the bag, and used the car late at night to drop his girlfriend off. He hasn’t produced the knives, he hadn’t brandished them, but on the face of it he had committed the offence of Possession of a Bladed Article. It was very possible that he could go to prison if convicted. It sounds unfair, and in this situation, it was unfair, in my view, as my client had obviously not given any thought to the fact that he had the knives in his kitbag,  but the Courts come down in knife offences very heavily.

I talked to him before Court and he told me he was a car, as he had told the police in his interview. I asked questions about his work, and it turned out that his business was entirely off the books. So there were no business card or letterheads, no accounts and his mate who, he told me, often worked with him, was working and being paid cash in hand, and did not want to incriminate himself in Court. I advised my client that he should nonetheless enter a not guilty plea. I advised him that the circumstances spoke for themselves. The knives were in a toolkit locked in the back of a car. I felt that most courts would say “well we’ve all done something like that” and would acquit him. The problem was, of course, he was not going to or from work.  This was when he told me that he worked all hours, as and when required. But could provide no evidence of this.

The prosecution produced the statement of the Police Officer which did not say exactly where the knives were, he just said they were in the boot with the tool kit. We agreed that evidence, as it did not contradict the view of my client, that the knives were actually in the bag. The Police evidence was simply lacking in detail. However two days before the trial the Prosecution tried to admit a further and more detailed statement from the same officer, which stated that the knives were on the opposite side of the boot to the tool bag. This was not accepted by myself or my client. The police officer was not in a position to attend Court so the Prosecution position was if the new statement was not accepted they would proceed without it. They proceeded without that potentially damaging evidence. The police had produced the new statement far too late and also it stretched credulity to believe that the police officer, when asked to improve his original statement by adding further detail, could actually remember the layout of the boot six months beforehand.

My client was arguing that he was a mechanic on call 24/7 and so had to have immediate access to his tool of the trade at any given time, wherever he was. If he had to return home from a call to the roadside somewhere at night he would likely lose the job, and during Covid times, he could not afford that loss. He gave me some background on his college and apprenticeship in car mechanics and his employment as a mechanic before being laid off. This, I knew, would be persuasive background. I could prove nothing by way of documentary evidence but then there was no basis for the Prosecutor to challenge that evidence.

The Prosecution evidence was read out. That took 5 minutes,  and then my client gave evidence and I took him through his education and training and employment and then his work as a car mechanic on call. The Prosecutor barely rose to challenge his evidence.  It was the detail of his instructions that, I believe, convinced the Court that he was carrying the items for the purpose of work. I asked him to explain what each knife was used for, what of the wheel assembly or engine that he would use them upon, and why he preferred a knife to a specific tool. I already had his instructions so I knew his answers would show he had some expertise in car mechanics, I could just allow him to talk about cars, and that would be enough.

I argued in closing that his tools of the trade, which the knives were part of, were needed as he was effectively working at any time and all the time, and so needed his tools with him all the time. The trial lasted 20 minutes and he was acquitted. That was the right result, but not, by any means, an inevitable result. We were able to surmount the difficulties presented by the lack of being able to exhibit evidence of his work, by concentrating on his personal knowledge of his work. There are, as they say, different ways to skin a cat.

Simon Mears

Assistant Solicitor

ZMS Solicitors