86
Thursday 23 May
In his chambers, Jupp turned to Brown. ‘Primrose, can you tell me what is going on here?’
She replied, ‘As I said in court, Your Honour, as a result of Starr giving evidence on behalf of the prosecution, a matter that I was going to bring up with him required me to seek a further opinion from a handwriting expert. My expert, Professor Shaw, has only just turned up having rushed here from another court appearance. I apologize to my learned friend, but I think it would be helpful to the court to hear his evidence. Mr Cork will be able to cross-examine him and I accept that he may, if not happy, ask you for a short adjournment to instruct his own witness, but I don’t believe that will be necessary. I appreciate that he can reserve that right.’
Jupp turned to Cork. ‘Your thoughts, Stephen?’
‘In the ideal world, of course, I’d like to have seen this evidence before, had time to consider it and make a judgement about instructing my own expert. I am mindful of where we are with the case at the moment and if I think I can deal with it today, I will, but I do reserve my prerogative of instructing my own witness if necessary.’
Jupp considered what he had heard for a few moments. ‘If that is your view, I would rather deal with this witness today, but that should not prevent you from making a proper evaluation of the handwriting evidence and you are right to take it further if necessary.’
The three of them returned to court.
87
Thursday 23 May
‘Let’s have the jury back,’ Jupp said to the jury bailiff after he had taken his seat.
The jury returned and took up their positions.
The judge turned to Primrose Brown. ‘You may proceed.’
‘Thank you, Your Honour.’
She stood. ‘I am calling Cambridge handwriting expert, Professor Geoff Shaw.’
A bright-eyed man in his forties, with a mane of wild, greying hair, stood in the dock, exuding confidence.
First, the QC established the professor’s credentials as a leading handwriting authority, which included listing a number of fraud trials in which evidence he had given was a major factor in securing convictions.
Shaw, speaking with an infectious enthusiasm, began by giving evidence regarding the alleged signature of Terence Gready on the Safe Box Co document. He referred to a series of slides on the monitor next to the judge. Each was of the signature, some showing it in its entirety, some enlarged details of one part of it.
He clicked a remote control. After a short delay the signature appeared on the monitor, Terence Gready, upright, with a separation between the first and last name, above the printed name SAFE BOX CO.
‘In the interests of brevity, I will explain to you the key points to look at, without going through all the minutiae of detail. All of you will be given a copy to study later. The first area to look at is the starting strokes, which you can see clearly highlighted in yellow on the first image,’ he said, checking against the document but keeping his main focus on eye contact with the jury. ‘Next, again highlighted, is a pen lift and the appearance of a tremor, indicative of hesitation and a lack of confidence.’
The third image now appeared. There were four yellow circles on different parts of the signature. ‘This is the most telling of all the three images, as it shows clear evidence of patching. For those of you unfamiliar with graphology language, patching is the term for touching up a piece of handwriting. There are four instances of such patching on this signature, each indicated by a yellow circle.’
Shaw paused, looking thoughtfully at the jury. ‘I don’t know if any of you ever make corrections to your own signature when you’ve just signed something, but I certainly don’t — and have never done so.’ He could see from their expressions they agreed.
Shaw continued. ‘My point is that each time you sign a document, your signature does not have to be an exact replica of any previous signature, it is simply your personal mark. So, I would ask you all to think very carefully about something: if this really was Terence Gready signing his name, why would he have subsequently touched up his signature so meticulously — in four different places?’
Brown said to the witness, ‘It is the defence’s submission that this account was not opened by my client, and this is not the signature of my client.’
Shaw replied, ‘It is my professional opinion that there are a number of anomalies with the signature, and it is not consistent with the defendant’s handwriting signature samples that I was provided with.’
Brown shuffled her papers, paused for a moment and then sat down.
Cork stood up and turned to Shaw. ‘Is it correct you have only had signatures to work on and no other handwriting samples?’
‘That is correct,’ Shaw replied.
‘Am I also correct in saying that where signatures are involved you are only able to say that it is more likely or less likely to have been signed by a particular individual?’
‘In many cases that is correct. It is always difficult when you are only working with signatures. But you are able to look and comment on similarities and construction of letters and words.’
‘The point I make, Professor Shaw,’ Cork said, ‘is that because you only have signatures to work with, the weight of this evidence is limited.’
Shaw paused for a moment. ‘What I am able to tell the court is that there is a possibility the defendant did not make this signature mark, and I can say its construction is unusual.’
‘One last question, Professor Shaw. Is it possible that somebody who was seeking to throw doubt on the originality of a signature could have done so in this way — could that person have deliberately made the signature look questionable?’
‘It is possible. I can say that this signature purported to have been made by Mr Gready is not consistent to others that I have seen from him. He may have signed it, but there again someone else may have signed it attempting to forge his signature.’
‘No more questions.’ Cork sat down.
Primrose Brown rose. ‘Professor Shaw, is it fair to say from your evidence that your conclusion is that it would be highly unusual for someone to sign their own habitual signature in this way?’
‘Yes.’
‘Thank you, no more questions.’
‘We will break for lunch,’ Jupp said.
88
Thursday 23 May
It was pelting with rain outside and most of the jurors, mindful of the forecast of heavy rain all day, had brought their lunch in with them. The few that didn’t had made a quick dash outside to get food and had brought it back with them. By 12.30 p.m. they were all seated around the table.
Meg’s hopes had been lifted by the defence QC’s handling of the handwriting evidence. No one could argue against what they had all just heard, could they? As she removed her egg and tomato sandwich from Laura’s lunch box, which had animals all over it, she was starting to feel increasingly optimistic. She put it down and made a note on the pad she’d been carrying in her handbag since the start of the triaclass="underline" Safety deposit box signature.
It was one more piece of evidence in Gready’s favour as there was some doubt as to its authenticity. As strong as the earlier challenges to the Financial Investigator’s evidence. There was nothing linking Terence Gready to any of the overseas bank accounts and transactions, other than circumstantial evidence. Until Michael Starr’s evidence — which Meg knew she would have to work on to discredit its validity — there was no evidence of him and Gready ever having met.
She glanced back through some of her notes. Some very strong arguments to put to her fellow jurors. Maybe, just maybe, she was going to be able to pull this off.