UK Offence Report

Provision of assistance, advice or training related to restricted goods

article 5 of The Liberia (United Nations Sanctions)(Channel Islands) Order 2004

This offence was read from the text as made, and no revised version was available, so a later revocation could not be ruled out. Check the current text at legislation.gov.uk.

What the provision says

5 Any person who, except under the authority of

a licence granted by the licensing authority under this article, directly or indirectly provides to any person in Liberia any

a assistance,

b advice, or

c training, related to the provision, manufacture, maintenance or use of restricted goods shall be guilty of an offence under this Order, unless he proves that he did not know and had no reason to suppose that the assistance, advice or training in question was to be provided to

a person in Liberia.

Text as made, from legislation.gov.uk. © Crown copyright, reused under the Open Government Licence v3.0. This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.

Who it binds, and what has to be proved

Binds
a person
Conduct
breaching the provision
Fault element
Strict liability
Burden of proof
Legal burden on the defendant

The prosecution must prove that the conduct happened. This is a strict liability offence as drafted: the provision uses no word of intention, knowledge, recklessness or negligence, so there is no need to show that a person meant to do it, knew about it, or was careless.

Intention, knowledge and carelessness are irrelevant to guilt. They may still matter a great deal to sentence.

The provision gives a defence the defendant must prove, on the balance of probabilities. A legal burden of that kind can be read down to a merely evidential one under section 3 of the Human Rights Act 1998 where placing it on the defendant would be disproportionate (R v Lambert [2001] UKHL 37; Sheldrake v DPP [2004] UKHL 43).

Classifier’s reasoning: no word of intention, knowledge, recklessness or negligence in the offence or its provision; other provisions of the same instrument use a mens rea word while this one does not (the Cundy v Le Cocq contrast).

The defence, as drafted

icted goods shall be guilty of an offence under this Order, unless he proves that he did not know and had no reason to suppose that the assistance, advice or training in question was to be provided to a person in Liberia.

What would breach article 5?

These are illustrations, not law. They are generated from the provision’s own words to show the shape of the offence. Whether any particular conduct is caught depends on the full text, on any amendment since, and on the facts.

  1. Doing what the provision prohibits, or failing to do what it requires under the Liberia (United Nations Sanctions)(Channel Islands) Order 2004.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Either way — magistrates’ court or Crown Court
Maximum fine
Not determined
Standard scale
Level 5
Maximum prison (summary)
6 months
Maximum prison (on indictment)
2 years

the level is stated but no money value is given: this instrument extends outside the United Kingdom, where the standard scale set by s.122(1) of the Sentencing Act 2020 does not run.

Sentencing

Offences of this kind are usually sentenced under the guidelines below. This is a mapping by subject, not a finding about this provision, and the links go to a search of the Sentencing Council’s own site.

Prosecution figures

No published per-offence figure was found for this provision, and it could not be matched to a Ministry of Justice offence code. Offences created by statutory instrument very largely do not have one. Absence of a figure is not evidence that the offence is unused.

Status and lifecycle

Current status
Status not determined
Made
11 February 2004
In force from
13 February 2004
Extent
Not stated

How this was established: read from the text as made; no revised version available, so later revocation could not be ruled out.

What the instrument is for

(This note is not part of the Order) — the explanatory note published with the instrument, © Crown copyright.

This Order, made under the United Nations Act 1946, implements in the Channel Islands the prohibition of the sale or supply of arms and related materiel to Liberia pursuant to decisions of the Security Council of the United Nations in resolution 1521 of 22nd December 2003. An earlier Order, the Liberia (United Nations Sanctions) (Channel Islands) Order 2001 (S.I. 2001/949) ceased to have effect by virtue of the cancellation of the relevant parts of the United Nations Security Council resolution 1343 of 7th March 2001.

Read the full note and every offence in this instrument

Other offences in the same instrument

How this was identified as an offence

Everything above rests on the judgement that this provision creates a criminal offence, rather than mentioning one. That judgement is made by rule, from the words of the provision, and this is the rule that made it — with a confidence of 0.92.

Basis
the provision says a person is “guilty of an offence”
Confidence
0.92 of 1.00

A provision that states a penalty for an offence created elsewhere can read very like one that creates an offence, and the rules can mistake the one for the other. If the text quoted above sets a penalty for something made an offence by another provision, treat the classification on this page with that in mind, and read the instrument.

Check the source