The Jury in the Ryan Giggs domestic abuse case have been unable to reach a majority verdict. Giggs faced trial on three counts. One of coercively controlling ex-partner Kate Greville, another of causing actual bodily harm to Ms Greville and a third of common assault of her sister. Returning “no verdict” leaves the CPS to decide if it is in the public interest to order a retrial. 

The dynamics of coercive abuse are complex and often very subtle

In my view it really is worthwhile, though with one significant change. The jury should be educated prior to trial about the features and dynamics of coercive control and domestic abuse. This should happen routinely in cases of this sort. The jury in this trial were unable to reach a unanimous verdict after five full days of deliberations. They were then given new instructions to deliver a majority verdict of 10 out of 11 jurors and they were still unable to do so. They said there was no prospect that they would ever be able to deliver a verdict. 

So why, with extensive evidence lasting many days, which seemed thorough and well-referenced by both sides; with star witness testimony and apparently exemplary counsel skills on display, was this jury unable to agree? 

Without any assumption of guilt or otherwise, I believe it is because, at least some of them, didn’t know what they were doing, looking at, hearing or being asked to judge. Coercive control is an offence still new to the criminal justice system and the behaviour only became a criminal offence in 2015. Though it is a huge and common feature of most domestic abuse, it is still one of the hardest to identify and evidence. If it was found not to exist in this case, that would also need a thorough understanding of why. It is only fair to the complainant and the accused. 

How can we expect any jury to identify features of this type of abuse when women themselves can’t? If it was easy to spot the abusive skills utilised in this devastating crime, then every woman would take a look in her notebook on encountering an abusive man and turn him around with a swift, “not today Satan!”. The dynamics of coercive abuse are complex and often very subtle, the methods so varied and extensive, that a woman’s notebook would need to be carried in a wheelbarrow. 

The counter argument advanced is that a jury is supposed to be a cross section of the public and as such they should not be educated. However, in a murder trial it would be reasonable to expect each juror to understand what constitutes murder, or even the concept of murder. Yet in the legal consideration of a really complex and recently established crime, one where a woman might be controlled by gestures such as the tapping of a nose or the curling of a fist, which have far deeper meaning to the woman controlled, we expect a “cross section of the public” to examine such evidence and understand it. It is an unreal expectation of jurors. Unless they themselves have experience or expert knowledge of the area. 

In this case and many others, a lot of defence evidence has focused on the “imperfect victim”. Online are cries of “she lied about cancer!”, regarding Kate Greville’s admission under cross-examination. Few of these outraged observers have asked why a complainant would need to lie about visiting the hospital or why she would not want sex with the accused and not be able to just say so. 

We hold those women to very high standards

An effective and informed jury ought to be at least considering those things, and whether they are features of being coercively abused, before coming to a conclusion either way. Many coercively controlled and abused women lie to the abuser. Abused women do many things which would appear terrible to one who has never experienced abuse and will appear unacceptable and indecipherable to some members of a twelve-person “cross section of society”. The offence is centred around coercion and control, and women being abused are not in control of themselves — that’s an intrinsic feature of the abuse. The societally imposed view of women who are “real” victims of male violence is as old as patriarchy. 

A jury would need to be able to scrutinise these myths and stereotypes and see if they are fairly applied in the case before them or not. We don’t expect a rescue dog who has been locked up, beaten and poorly fed to “behave well”, but we expect it from female complainants alleging that they have been abused, isolated from family and friends (effectively locked in a cage), sometimes also raped and beaten and on and on. We hold those women to very high standards and they often don’t meet them. They might snarl on occasion. They might have lied to stay alive or sane. They may have done any number of things. The focus shouldn’t be on them alone. 

The character statement of Alex Ferguson in favour of Giggs was a focal point of this trial. But whilst these were two huge celebrities, in many similar trials you would expect friends of the accused to appear and say they “saw nothing of his aggression. He’s a great guy.” Men who do abuse women, and I’m not saying Giggs is one of them, would be highly unlikely to do it in front of their boss. Or anyone else. There is a reason people say, “you don’t know what goes on behind closed doors” when discussing abuse. That’s because an abuser keeps his friends close, and his criminal behaviour close to home. ]

I obviously don’t comment on the guilt or otherwise of Ryan Giggs, because I would like to see a fair retrial with an appropriately informed jury who can evaluate the evidence before them confidently. But they must be able to sift that evidence in a knowledgeable way. 

You wouldn’t have a jury in a murder trial where a man was shot who didn’t understand how a gun worked. So why do we expect women to prove coercive control to a jury who don’t properly understand it?