Joint Enterprise: Convicting children for murders they did not commit - Guest blog by JENGbA

AYJ member, Longford Prize-winning Joint Enterprise Not Guilty by Association (JENGbA), shares a guest blog highlighting how children are being convicted of murders that they did not commit.

“JENGbA is a grassroots campaign made up mostly of mothers who have lost their children to the prison system under the discredited doctrine of joint enterprise. Joint enterprise is a common law doctrine that means in murder cases people who have not carried out the fatal blow, or in some cases who weren’t even at the scene of a crime, can be convicted of a murder they did not plan, take part in, or foresee.

For example, our co-founder Janet Cunliffe's 15-year-old son was convicted of murder he did not commit, and that he didn’t see as he was blind. The best friend of the son of Gloria Morrison, JENGbA’s other co-founder, was involved in a fight he tried to stop, and received a life sentence. JENGbA’s aims are to support the prisoners and families convicted using joint enterprise and to fight to have the joint enterprise law abolished in its current form. 

What is joint enterprise – and what evidence is used for it?

The evidence used against children and young people in joint enterprise convictions can be as insignificant as a phone call. A conviction can even occur as a result of your phone being switched off during an attack that you aren’t present for, which is interpreted as you being 'radio silent' because you are seen as having known that a crime is going to be committed. The evidential bar is so low that the link can be merely a friendship or family connection with perpetrators. It is lazy evidence leading to lazy convictions. 

Drill and Rap music are treated as indicators of a criminal mind rather than cultural choices. Colour and postcodes are used as evidence of gangs, and previous convictions - even very minor ones - as indicators of criminal futures. 

Children and young people are often tried in adult court: they don’t understand the language used in these courts, like ‘parasitic accessorial liability’ or ‘conditional intent’. The language used in court is often derogatory – ‘feral’, ‘animals’, ‘wolflike’, ‘scum’. These are highly educated prosecutors who know how to manipulate a jury into believing that defendants are master criminals and murderers. 

When my son's friend went to prison in 2006, joint enterprise was not widely known about; there was nothing on the web, and very little to explain how you could be convicted for a crime as serious as murder when you haven’t murdered anyone. Now joint enterprise seems like the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS)’s go-to charge.

Police, but mainly prosecutors, should be held accountable for the disproportionality and injustice involved in joint enterprise cases. We have been arguing for years to see the charging decisions in multi-handed cases (where more than one defendant is being charged for an offence), so defendants know what actual evidence - not assumptions – is being used to charge them with murder. But it is refused as client privilege - the client being the police.

Disproportionality in joint enterprise convictions:

The main thrust is towards children of colour and working-class communities. The latest CPS data shows that in the pilot scheme monitoring cases in 6 CPS areas, Black boys are 16 times more likely to be convicted than White boys.

Often, even if the word ‘gang’ is not used, juries believe that it is implied, especially in cases involving young black males – and where gang narratives are involved, children are more likely to be seen as guilty. 

Judges and the Prosecutors don’t care that defendants are vulnerable children and young adults. Even learning difficulties are ignored, especially neurodiversity which is often hidden. ‘Substantial injustice tests’ are also imposed by the courts – meaning a person convicted under the wrong interpretation of the law must prove their innocence first before they can be granted an appeal. At present, no one convicted under joint enterprise has any meaningful access to appeals because of this test. Cases of children with learning difficulties and autism were taken back to the Court of Appeal but dismissed as they did not pass the test. If the court allowed these innocent children to be exonerated, it would set precedent for other cases involving neurodiverse children

How can we help?

JENGbA needs support from any organisation who believes in children's rights and proper justice. We are supporting Kim Johnson MP’s Private Members’ Bill in the Commons, about to have its second reading on 2nd February 2024. Over 170 actors, academics, legal experts, trade unionists, heads of civil society organisations, campaigners and Lords have signed an open letter supporting the Bill, and it has cross-party support from MPs, but we need all MPs to get involved. Ask everyone in your network to contact MPs, urging them to get on board with this bill and demanding a debate in the House of Commons on the overcharging of joint enterprise. You could also ask the Justice Select Committee to do a Full Inquiry on the topic; this has never been done before.

You can support JENGbA on social media (@JENGbA on Twitter) and ask children to speak up about it.  

To find out more, you can tune in to Law in Action’s episode which features a young man, put away aged 15, talking about his joint enterprise case. It’s a brilliant interview, and it would be great if people’s networks could listen in.”