A leading QC has insisted rape victims are treated fairly in Scottish courts after the country's most senior judge repeated concerns over the way they are cross-examined in the witness box.
Veteran advocate Gordon Jackson warned of the potentially chilling effect that "judicial criticism" could have on the defences of those accused of sexual offences.
Writing in The Herald, Mr Jackson was responding to new remarks from Lord Carloway, the Lord President, signalling that courts would protect alleged victims of sex crimes from tough grilling by defence agents.
Lord Carloway, pictured below, said: "It is the duty of the court to stop abuses of the privilege of cross-examination.
"The dignity of the witness has to be protected and repetitive questions, insulting questions, have to be eliminated."
Lord Carloway, in warning to zealous defence agents, said judges must step in to protect complaining witnesses from "protracted or vexatious questioning".
This delighted victims' rights and women's groups, who have been horrified at the way sex crime complainers are treated in court.
But it horrified some advocates, who felt that they may be restricting in pursuing the most zealous defence possible of clients accused of very serious crimes.
In his Herald article, Mr Jackson, pictured above, a former Labour MSP, said defence agents should be able to "conduct the trial without constantly looking over their shoulder and worrying about their own position".
He agreed with Lord Carloway that advocates already have to worry that their clients may claim they were badly represented in a so-caled Anderson Appeal.
But he added: "What will only make the situation worse however is the added fear of judicial criticism.
"Of course, a witness should not be insulted or harassed and a judge is fully entitled to stop that happening.
"I support the proposal that a complainer has the right to be heard when the defence seeks her medical records; all well and good but there also seems to be an underlying suggestion that, nowadays, counsel regularly or generally cross exam in an inappropriate manner.
"That may happen on occasions but it most definitely is not the norm. Many lines of questioning must, in any event, be authorised in advance by the judge."
Mr Jackson stressed that he was not aware of judges allowing "questions during a trial that are irrelevant and designed to upset and insult the witness".
He added: "If, however, that is the case and judges are not doing their job properly then I assume Lord Carloway himself can deal with that issue."
"Defending and cross examining in such trials is not easy.
"The advocate is an officer of the court but is not an intermediary. His or her role in an adversarial system is to properly and robustly represent the interests of the accused and to do that fearlessly."
Sandy Brindley, of Rape Crisis Scotland, pictured below, said: "At times rape complainers can feel that no one is protecting them in court."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel