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6. 71
Where the charges are dissimilar [e.g. a book-making, a loan-sharking and a wounding charge] a court would not permit these to be tried together even if the charges were placed by the prosecutors on the same indictment. If the prosecutor did this, unless the charges were closely related [e.g. arose immediately out of the same incident] almost inevitably the charges would be severed from each other, and would be tried separately.
6.72
One limited solution to these problems is to employ the charge of conspiracy. Conspiracy is an agreement by two or more people to do an unlawful act or a lawful act by unlawful means. Thus a series of charges of blackmail might be charged as conspiracy to blackmail. The essence of such a charge is the agreement. One would have to prove the substantive charges to prove that the conspirators had in fact agreed to commit the crimes.
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6.73 The limitations on the use of conspiracy are many The first limitation of significance here is that, in general, a prosecutor cannot charge a conspiracy to commit dissimilar crimes. For example, a conspiracy to commit book-making, loan-sharking and wounding would not be permitted at law. At best one could charge three separate conspiracies. Secondly, even where conspiracy is a possible charge, there is a rule of practice, enshrined in a judicial practice direction, that, unless there are exceptional circumstances, a charge of conspiracy cannot be tried at the same time as substantive charges which make up part of the conspiracy.
6.74
The effect of this is that where the person commits crimes as a member of an organised crime syndicate, the rules of practice described above inhibit or prohibit the prosecutor from presenting the full picture of the criminal involvement of the accused to the court. Where the accused's crimes are unrelated this is entirely fair to the accused. Where they are part of a pattern of organised crime, one criminal act providing the motive and background of another, then to present them as the law presently requires, means that, at best, the courts see only a blinkered, segmented picture. It follows that, because a court may only receive and consider relevant evidence, the evidence linking the crimes into a pattern is legally irrelevant and therefore the courts may not receive and consider that evidence.
6.75 What is suggested is that where a series of crimes are linked in a pattern of organised crime there should be a means by which a prosecutor can present his case to reflect such a pattern. Because against that, where there is no such link, or no provable one, it is fair that an accused be entitled to have his charges presented in a segmented way, as the law presently requires.