Unjust cuts: the case of Sam Hallam

By Tom Ogg

This afternoon, a full orchestra of young people played in the cold, out on the street outside the Ministry of Justice.

It was a vigil for a young man named Sam Hallam, who was wrongly convicted of murder in 2005. Two years ago the Sam Hallam campaign submitted a dossier of evidence to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) including a dozen witnesses of the murder who say that Sam was not there. But two years on, Sam’s still not been freed – the vigil marks the date over 700 days ago when the evidence was submitted.

It has taken two years, we believe, because the CCRC is seriously underfunded, and has suffered severe cuts in the last few years. Each caseworker at the CCRC has up to fifty cases to deal with – an enormous workload. No wonder Sam’s case has taken so long to deal with. The Ministry of Justice is responsible for the funding of the CCRC, which is why we played outside its buildings today.

Yet while the CCRC has faced cuts, the Ministry of Justice has been refurbishing its new offices, to the tune of £130 million, including £170,000 on artwork. The CCRC’s budget, by contrast, is a mere £7 million, about a twentieth of the cost of the MoJ’s refurbishment.

Cuts hurt. Sam has lost two years of his life waiting for the CCRC. One of the young people playing outside the MoJ today composed a piece called ‘Lost Time’ to commemorate Sam’s time inside waiting for the CCRC. Fittingly, we also played the overture from Beethoven’s Fidelio (Fidelio was a political prisoner) and a movement from Oliver Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time.

More details of our event can be found here.