§ Mr. WyattTo ask the Solicitor-General what the(a) legal costs of the defendants' two trials and (b) total 971W cost to the Crown Prosecution Service were in the case against Prison Officers Rowland, Kerry and Watkins at Elmley Prison. [166226]
§ The Solicitor-GeneralI can only provide details of the costs incurred by the Crown Prosecution Service, for which both the Attorney and I have ministerial responsibility.
The Crown Prosecution Service costs are approximately £146,878.04. However, this figure may be reduced as the Crown Prosecution Service is currently seeking a reduction in the amount of counsel's fees claimed.
The prosecution's costs are broken down in the following table:
Prosecution's costs (£) (a) Counsel's fees: at the magistrates' court to include the old style committal 12,978.35 for the preliminary hearing in 2001 27,766.19 the final invoice (being challenged) to include re-instituting proceedings and the trial 96,033.50 Total 136,778.04 (b) Experts' fees: 1,100.00 (c) charges for enhancement of the recordings of intercepted telephone calls and for their
compilation and indexation on a compact disc:
9,000.00 The CPS is unable routinely to assess and attribute its own overhead costs to individual cases.