As to what standard they use, it is a judgment call, of course :), but the more complex the facts, and the legal issues, the more likely they will find that the accused needs counsel to have a fair trial.
I knew where this case was going just from reading the opening paragraphs:
[QUOTE=SOUTHWARK CROWN COURT]
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The defendants are charged with offences of conspiracy to defraud, possessing criminal property and offences contrary to s.19 and 23(1), and s.177(4)(a) of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000. The evidence is complex and substantial. The volume of papers amounts to some 46,030 pages. There are in addition 194 excel spreadsheets with a combined total of 864,200 lines of entry. The Case Summary covers 55 pages.
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In essence the Crown alleges that between 2008 and 2011 the defendants were involved in a land banking scheme using, variously, three limited companies. Those companies acquired, or purported to acquire, sites which were then divided into a number of sub-plots. It is alleged that those sub-plots were then aggressively marketed to members of the public – often vulnerable members of the public – who were persuaded to buy based on false representations as to the nature of the company selling the sub-plots, the professionals they employed, as to planning permission, potential purchasers of the sites for onward development and their previous success. Some purchasers were given good title, some were not, and some sub-plots were sold more than once. Various interventions by the FSA (as it then was) to stop the practices were subverted by transferring the fraudulent scheme to a new company.
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The rôles of the defendants range from the directing minds of the fraud (Crawley and Daley), the senior managers (Forsyth, Peters and Petrou), the salesmen (Mitchie and Hawkins) to the conveyancing solicitor (Walker). There is to be a cutthroat defence run as between Crawley and Walker and it is likely that other defendants will seek to blame co-defendants.
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