Simon Spence QC was appointed Queen's Counsel on 30 March 2009. He undertakes an even mix of prosecuting and defending work across Suffolk, Essex, Norfolk and London. Before taking silk, he worked regularly as a leading junior and often led in high-profile cases. In 2008 he was the Prosecution junior in the successful prosecution of Steve Wright, the man accused of murdering five Ipswich prostitutes.
He specialises in cases of serious violence (having been counsel of first choice for both prosecution and defence in a number of local celebrated murder cases: R v Tucker (1997), R v Hall (2003), and R v Nunn and Hill (2006)).
The drugs cases in which he has been instructed include large-scale undercover operations (recently, Operations Wolf, Peseta, Academy, Theatre).
The sexual offences cases have had a particular emphasis on child abuse and cases involving witnesses with disabilities. In recent years, he has prosecuted rape cases involving a deaf complainant who gave her evidence by sign language and a mute complainant who gave evidence by typing answers projected onto a screen in court. He was instructed in these and other cases, having developed a reputation for advising the CPS on the preparation and conduct of cases involving vulnerable and special needs complainants.
In addition was briefed to prosecute all illegal entry cases in Suffolk for a number of years.
Since taking silk, Simon has defended in multi-complainant historic sexual abuse and murder cases. This year he is instructed to prosecute and defend in further murder cases and to respond in the case of R v Hall, in which he was originally the prosecution junior in 2003 and which has been referred back to the Court of Appeal by the Criminal Cases Review Commission following fresh forensic evidence being obtained.
Cases of note
R v Michael Billings, 2010, Norwich Crown Court; Appeared for: Defence
Simon recently defended in one of the first Health and Safety prosecutions following the change in the law to allow a power of imprisonment for Health and Safety breaches where no death resulted. It was a very high profile and sensitive case in which a young tenant of the defendant's received very serious burn injuries but where there were real issues of causation in respect of the fire.
R v Steve Wright (21.02.08; Ipswich Crown Court): Appeared for: Prosecution.
The widely reported murder of five women working as prostitutes in the Ipswich area. Wright was found guilty of murdering all five women over a six and a half week period . The prosecution case involved the matching of fibres taken from the victims and of DNA, with samples taken from Wright in 2001.
R v Abdullahi (24.07.06; Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) [2006] EWCA Crim 2060 [2007] 1 W.L.R. 225 [2007] 1 Cr. App. R. 14 Times, August 24, 2006; Appeared for: Prosecution at Trial and Respondent
This Court of Appeal judgment concerned the meaning of 'for the purposes of sexual gratification' in section 12(1) of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 in circumstances where pornography had been shown to the complainant by the defendant who had then proceeded to assaulted him sexually several hours later. The Court of Appeal held that it was not necessary for the sexual assault to follow immediately upon the showing of the pornographic image, if it was part of a longer term plan formed by the accused.
R v Gorringe (04.11.04; Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) [2004] EWCA Crim 3152 2004 WL 3089094; Appeared for Prosecution at Guilty Plea and Respondent on Appeal.
This was the first case to expressly distinguish in terms of sentence between single images and video footage in cases of downloading child pornography. The Court of Appeal held that, for the purposes of sentence, an obscene video that lasted two and half hours contained hundreds of images and should not therefore be considered as a single image.
R v Terence Robert Smith (02.05.03; Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) [2003] EWCA Crim 1240 2003 WL 21047331; Appeared for: Prosecution (junior) at Trial and Respondent (alone):
This was the successful resistance of an appeal against a conviction for murder concerning the potential impact of a witness who the prosecution had declined to call or interview. An important case on the duty of the prosecution to investigate and to call potentially relevant and undermining evidence.
R v Morhall (20.07.95) [1996]AC 90; [1995] 3 All ER 659; Appeared for: Prosecution at Trial and Respondent in Court of Appeal and House of Lords
An appeal against conviction for murder on the grounds that the trial judge misdirected the jury as to the temporary effects of self-induced intoxication as opposed to the underlying addiction in respect of provocation and the characteristics of the ‘reasonable man’.
R v Gotts (02.02.92) [1992] 2 AC 412; [1992] 1 All ER 832 Appeared for: Respondent in Court of Appeal and House of Lords
An appeal against conviction following a guilty plea to Attempted Murder, following the trial judge’s ruling that duress was not available as a defence to a charge of Attempted Murder.
