I have not read anywhere about following methods. I just observed them during hearings of Criminal Matters in Supreme Court. There may be better methods which I may have missed.
1) Method of understanding which witness said what :
I once appeared before a bench presided by Justice K. T. Thomas for final hearing of a Criminal Appeal.
He first asked me about number of accused, date of offence, convictions under sections etc.
Then he started questions in following way.
Who is witenss No.1 ? What does he say about about accused? What does he say in cross examination? Why did Prosecution examined this witness?
Then same questions about witness No.2 and so on till the last witness.
By this method one can have considerable grasp over whole appeal in short time.
2) Method of understanding criminal case by making notes against each exhibits.
Once I had engaged Senior Advocate Sushil Kumar in a criminal appeal. He is considered one of the top criminal lawyers of India.
I saw that he worked hard. He used to be in his chamber at 8:00 am to read his cases.
In this case, it appeared that he had made notes in his register about each exhibit in criminal case. This is a deeper method. It needs hard work. A Criminal case may have over 300 exhibits. In his register, he had made his notes against each exhibit. This is a thorough method. The moment you make such notes, you begin to see a way out from an otherwise airtight looking case.
I copied his method in a criminal appeal. While making notes against each exhibits, I came across an inland letter which had two postal stamps on it. The significance of these postal stamps were missed by all Courts below. On basis of these postal stamps, one husband and his father and mother were acquitted by Supreme Court. (Justice A.K. Patnaik and Justice S. G. Mukhopadhyay bench) https://indiankanoon.org/doc/50240550/
3) Method of Understanding minute to minute time line of what happened preceding the moment of crime and what happened immediately after crime, on minute to minute basis till the investigation is over.
Once I was sitting in Court presided by Justice G.T.Nanavati. Hearing of a Criminal Appeal was going on.
It appeared that the timeline of crime event was being examined on minute to minute basis.
It was probably a case where multiple Dying Declarations were relied upon by prosecution. In such cases, such minute to minute analysis of crime scene can bring out truth or falsehood of evidences.
This is probably very tough method. It requires hard work plus imagination to examine time gaps and its relevance.
These are the three broad methods that can help in preparing a Criminal Appeal.
Haresh Raichura 16/11/16
