"Wdtabor" wrote in message ...
In article , "Paul Sengupta"
writes:

When
he was first acquitted (before appeal) there was huge public
support for him.

The Government can appeal an aquittal in Britain?

Here, in the States, if you are aquitted, that's it. No double jeopardy, no
second guessing of a finding of fact by a jury, only appeals of procedural
error.

The principle of the prohibition on double jeopardy in the U.S. Constitution was
actually based on British law. Britain does have a prohibition against trying someone
anew for the same crime he has previously been acquitted. However, in certain cases
the prosecution does have avenues to appeal the acquittal (sort of an extension of the
first prosecution, not a second trial).

There has been move afoot both in the UK and in some other areas of the commonwealth
(such as Australia) to further broaden the cases where prosecution appeals could be made.
Some of this is internally generated by an attempt to increase the ability to combat serious
crime in the light of new evidence such as DNA testing. Part is also that bringing British
law in line with the EU law considerably weakens the double jeopardy and certain other
long standing principles of British law.