A Plymouth-based firm has succeeded – in part – in a High Court appeal against legal aid payments over the number of pages of prosecution evidence.

Parlby Somerville Ltd represented an individual who appeared at Plymouth Crown Court charged with two counts of sexual assault. The firm submitted a claim to the Legal Aid Agency, under the Litigation Graduated Fees Scheme, for 2,864 pages of prosecution evidence (PPE). The determining officer allowed 201 pages.

The judgment in R v Steven Jarrold acknowledged ‘pursuant to this appeal the Respondent has allowed another 173 pages of electronic evidence, making a total of 374 PPE’.

Costs judge Whalan said he was ‘satisfied’ the 10% concession in respect of the image files was ‘reasonable and correct’. He added: ‘A reference was made to a potential, prejudicial photograph in the defendant’s text messages, and so images formed reasonably a relevant part of the PPE count. On the facts of this case, it seems to me that a 10% allowance is well within the parameters of a reasonable allocation.’

Referring to the video evidence, 365 pages of electronic datum, the judge said: ‘It may well be that this element was not previously emphasised before the [determining officer] or the LAA.’

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Allowing the appeal ‘to the extent and I direct that [Parlby Somerville Ltd’s] LGFS claim should be recalculated by reference to 739 (365+374) PPE', the judge said: ‘Given the complainant’s initial reference to a video, I am satisfied that this datum also forms part of the relevant PPE.

‘It was reasonable, it seems to me, for [Parby Somerville Ltd] to consider this datum as a potential source of compromising evidence. Although the % approach could arguably apply to video evidence, this is, in my judgement, a more difficult and artificial proposition. In any event, on the facts of this case, I would allow the video evidence as a whole in the PPE count.’

The judge ordered the appropriate additional payment, the £100 paid on appeal plus £250 costs and any VAT payable to be made to the firm.