Criminal evidence and procedure – Mutual corroboration – Judge's charge. High Court of Justiciary: In an appeal by an appellant who was convicted of eleven charges, involving rape, assault and sexual assault and relating to four different complainers, the court held that the trial judge's failure to give the jury sufficiently clear guidance about the correct approach when facing a time gap of 11 years or more between three charges involving assaults and rape in 2014 and the other charges on the indictment, in particular a clear mention of the need for some special or compelling feature of the conduct being considered such that the jury would be entitled to apply the doctrine of mutual corroboration despite the significant time gap, amounted to a material misdirection leading to a miscarriage of justice in respect of the three charges relating to events in 2014; however, the court was not persuaded that any miscarriage of justice had occurred in relation to the remaining eight charges.