Rex Tedd KC

Mining

• Instructed by H.M. Mining Inspectorate and HSE to prosecute UK Coal , two of its senior officers, and others (including the National Coal Mining Museum) in respect of a series of mining fatalities and other grave incidents . These involved variously Daw Mill [the “Warwickshire Thick” seam] , Thoresby and Kellingley collieries.

This was “longwall retreat” mining, at depths of 1,000+ feet. With few exceptions, these cases concerned mining fatalities. Their subject matter included variously: fall of ground [collapse of insufficiently supported tunnel sidewalls]; methane (fire-damp), especially in dips in roadways; “cracking” chocks; illicit “man-riding” on conveyors; drifts and “endless” rope haulage systems; unsafe practices while operating paddy trains & other underground vehicles; exhaust ventilation methods, and inadequate design/positioning of brattices; electrical faults;  inadequate inspections by deputies/overmen and incorrect positioning/use of “clam-shell” chocks; fire and explosion (and the use of stone dust to reduce risk of either); and the Mines Rescue Service.

• He gave extensive advice on the hazards from extensive, ill-mapped and highly unstable discontinued mine workings in a former Welsh mining area. This was described in one report as “The most dangerous site in the U.K.”. Its old slag heaps overlooked a residential area, giving rise to a “moving mountain” risk, as in the Aberfan** tragedy. He also advised on the measures needed to make the area safe and suitable for development.

Residential Care Homes/Safety of Staff and Residents

• A lengthy trial, instructed by Care Quality Commission [CQC], prosecuting an NHS Trust and a care home proprietor. The defendants wrongly decided to accommodate in an inappropriate home a dangerous man with a serious psychiatric history. He found a knife (not kept securely) and stabbed to death a female member of the home’s staff.

• A lengthy trial, briefed to defend the lead defendant in a series of trials of about 20 staff members of the Atlas Group, which had a number of residential homes catering for residents with “seriously challenging behaviour”. Rex Tedd and Bernard Thorogood’s client was the founder & controller of the Atlas Group, and was the first defendant in the first trial. The prosecuting leading counsel was the Leader of the Western Circuit . The prosecuting authority regarded the case as very important to “set an example” to other such homes.

The complaint was that residents (often with psychiatric problems) were confined for lengthy periods, in distressing circumstances,  in ”quiet rooms” if in the view of staff they had “misbehaved”. The case required detailed knowledge of mental health legislation and the DOLS system. It concerned a huge quantity of medical & observational records of residents at 4 different Atlas homes.

The defence, which Rex Tedd K.C. spear-headed & co-ordinated with other defence teams, dealt crushing blows to the prosecution case. Most defendants in the first trial were acquitted on all counts,  save that (a) the jury failed to reach verdicts on a few counts, and (b) Rex Tedd’s client was convicted on a minor count , for which he was fined. However, that conviction was quashed on appeal.

The overall consequence was that the prosecution was constrained to offer no evidence against most of the 20 defendants, the main exceptions being two defendants whose cases had special features.

• The defence of a troubled & truculent teenager charged with murder. She lived under supervision in a terraced house with care staff. One evening, when refused permission to “go out on the town” she became aggressive. The member of staff involved retreated (in accordance with standing instructions, into an upstairs office. On her way out, the teenage defendant set fire to notices on a downstairs notice board in the sitting room. Fire spread through the floor boards of the office, and the care worker was burned alive – a horrific event captured on a recording.

The key factual issue was whether the defendant had also set fire to items in other areas of the sitting room. If so, that would have been strongly suggestive of intent to kill or cause grievous bodily harm – the requisite mental element for murder.

The expert reports provided no innocent explanation. However, Rex Tedd K.C. spent a lengthy period at the scene and noticed a pile of ash on the burnt-out remains of a sofa. His equally lengthy examination of photographs of the living room while in use showed that the pile of ash consisted of the corporeal remains of “Big Dave”, a giant teddy bear who was normally perched there, his head high above the level of the sofa. This provided a realistic explanation of the spread of fire from a single point of ignition – “flash-over” onto Big Dave’s head and thence to other areas.

The defendant was acquitted of murder. She had pleaded guilty at an early stage to manslaughter.

Railway Safety

• As a junior, Rex Tedd was often briefed by British Rail to attend inquests on rail passengers who had fallen through open carriage doors during travel. The key question was always “How did the door come to be open?” , which in those days generally received the reply “The deceased must have opened it, perhaps by It is now generally understood that under certain conditions during travel the carriage elongates slightly, thus releasing the door catch without human intervention.
• Rex Tedd defended one of two young railway employees in the “runaway train” case. A goods train came into a station at night with a “hot box”. The inexperienced guard , and equally inexperienced employee in charge of the station at night decided to split the train, and the locomotive hauled some of the waggons  However, in their inexperience they neglected to set the brakes on the other waggons, which were standing on a slight slope, and began to roll backwards with increasing speed as the two men ran alongside trying to secure the brakes.

The waggons went onto the main line, gathering momentum, ultimately smashing into another train in the mouth of a tunnel, killing the driver of that train. The evidence established that the true fault was that of senior staff who had instructed the young men , who had little relevant experience, training or experience, to fill such responsible positions. Both defendants were acquitted.

• Rex Tedd , as a junior, defended one of several youths charged with taking locomotives and other railway offences. This was curious – perhaps unique – case which (happily) did not result in death or injury.

The defendants discovered how to break into engine sheds at night and how to start up the diesel locomotives (using a tea spoon as a key). They set signals that enabled them to drive the locomotives onto the main line, doing so in the middle of the night when there was no other traffic.  On several nights they raced the locomotives against one another, and coupled them together to have a tug-of-war.

All defendants pleaded guilty, and a merciful Recorder imposed conditional discharges.

Water Safety

• At a river festival, a small cabin cruiser manned by the three defendants was dangerously overloaded and capsized, causing the death by drowning of a passenger who was trapped underwater in the cabin. Rex Tedd KC’s client was the only defendant acquitted, essentially on the basis that the defence had established that her role in managing the boat was minimal.

Environmental Crime

• The general subject matter is protection of the environment, especially SSSIs and other sensitive sites from commercial activities by landowners. Cases include the leading authority on the level of sentence necessary for that purpose, given that the defendant landowners are generally men of financial substance.

In that case, Rex Tedd KC and Bernard Thorogood were instructed by Natural England to prosecute the landowner, a multi-millionaire owner of a “household name” business. The defendant eventually pleaded guilty, but a Newton hearing took about a week. The fine & costs came to almost £1 million. The defendant appealed unsuccessfully to the Court of Appeal (presided over by the Lord Chief Justice), and thereafter , with equal lack of success, to the European Court.