Edward John Griew
Professor Edward John Griew was an English legal scholar, barrister and law reformer whose work bridged legal practice, academic theory, and legislative reform. His writings on theft, dishonesty, recklessness, and jury directions shaped the structure and interpretation of modern English criminal law.
He was Professor of Law at the Universities of Leicester and Nottingham, an adviser to the Judicial Studies Board and Law Commission, and a long-serving contributor to the Criminal Law Review.
Early life and education
Griew was born in 1926 in England. He was educated at King Edward's School, Birmingham, and he studied law at University College London. He was called to the Bar at Gray’s Inn in 1950.Academic career
After lecturing at UCL, Griew joined the University of Leicester, later becoming Professor of Law, Pro-Vice-Chancellor, and Public Orator. In the late 1980s he moved to the University of Nottingham where he would become Emeritus Professor.His teaching and writing covered theft, dishonesty, recklessness, mental disorder, and the moral foundations of criminal law.
Griew was a long-serving member of the Criminal Law Review editorial board and its General Editor from 1964 to 1966.
Criminal Code Project
Griew was a member of the group of academic lawyers chaired by Professor J.C. Smith who, in the early 1980s, worked under the auspices of the Law Commission to report on consolidation and codification of the general part of the criminal law into a Criminal Code. Smith, Griew and Dr Ian Dennis co-authored Codification of the Criminal Law, a Report to the Law Commission.Their analytical work from 1983–1985 was incorporated into the Commission's final report, A Criminal Code for England and Wales. Griew’s analyses of dishonesty and recklessness are cited in discussions of mens rea and general principles of criminal liability.
For the history of consolidation and codification more generally, see Criminal Code of England and Wales.
Judicial Studies Board
Griew was an academic adviser to the Judicial Studies Board, serving on its Crown Court Committee and helping to draft the first Specimen Directions to the Jury, the forerunner of the modern Crown Court Bench Book and Judicial College Crown Court Compendium.In Summing-Up the Law Crim.L.R. 768 he argued that judges should “protect the jury from the law” by using clear, factual language—a principle adopted by the JSB in its guidance on summing-up.
Impact and legacy
Griew was an early and staunch critic of the Court of Appeal's formulation of the test of dishonesty in R v Ghosh EWCA Crim 2: see "Dishonesty—The Objections to Feely and Ghosh" Crim.L.R. 341. Ultimately, his views were vindicated when Ghosh was doubted by the Supreme Court in Ivey v Genting Casinos UKSC 67 and set aside by the Court of Appeal in R v Barton and Booth EWCA Crim 575.His approach to jury directions, urging simplicity and moral intelligibility, underpins the Judicial College’s current model directions.
Selected publications
Books
- Griew, Edward. The Theft Acts 1968 . London: Sweet & Maxwell.
- Griew, Edward. Dishonesty and the Jury. Leicester: Leicester University Press.
- Griew, Edward. The Criminal Law Act 1977: Commentary and Analysis. London: Sweet & Maxwell, 1977.