High Court
High Court criminal jurisdiction - year ended 31 December 2016
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Note: On 1 July 2013, the procedural provisions affecting criminal trials changed with the commencement of most of the Criminal Procedure Act 2011 (CPA) provisions. Only a small number of High Court trial trials on hand remain to be dealt with under the previous legislation, the Summary Proceedings Act 1957 (SPA). Under the CPA, cases that are High Court-only offences (generally murder/manslaughter) have their first appearance in the District Court and are then managed in the High Court from second appearance onwards. The rest of the trials heard in the High Court are known as “protocol cases”. [1] Protocol cases are made up mainly of serious sexual, violence, drug and fraud offences. After a case review hearing in the District Court, a High Court judge determines whether the protocol case should be heard in the High Court or District Court. If the case is ordered to be heard in the High Court, it is counted as a High Court case from that time. As there are two procedural regimes in place, decisions were made about how to describe the caseload of criminal trials, to enable valid volume comparisons across years. Cases are counted as ready for trial under the SPA once they are committed for trial, and they are counted as ready for trial under the CPA once they have had a case review hearing or protocol determination. |
This analysis compares figures as at 31 December 2016 and 31 December 2015.
Criminal trials
This year the number of new criminal trials received by the High Court decreased to 162, down from 220 last year. Of these 162 new trials, 12 were split/reactivated cases from another High Court case. Of the new trials received in the period, 27% were murder/manslaughter cases and 30% were sexual assault charges.
As at 31 December 2016, there were 124 active criminal trial cases. This is a 17% decrease compared with the previous year when there were 150 trial cases on hand. Of those 124 active trials, 120 follow the CPA process. Despite a drop in the number of trials on hand, estimated hearing days remain high.
The total number of cases disposed [i] decreased by 7% to 171, down from 183 in the previous year. Of these disposals with final outcomes, 39% of cases were disposed by guilty plea (compared with 27% in the previous year).
There was a 4% increase in the number of trials held, up from 80 last year to 83 this year. Of these trials held, 16% were disposed by guilty plea on the day (compared with 20% in the earlier period).
The median waiting time to trial from committal (SPA) or post case review (CPA) process was 294 days this year, a decrease of 53 days from last year ( 347 median days).
Ninety four percent (94%) of the cases disposed follows the Criminal Procedure Act 2011 (CPA) process. The average age of CPA cases disposed was 462 days. High Court direct-committal cases (category 4 cases) took an average of 412 days and the cases that were required a trial location decision (such as protocol and s70 cases) took 476 days [ii] .
The Summary Proceedings Act 1957 (SPA) cases disposed during the year are necessarily older than CPA cases. A total of 11 cases were disposed of with an average age of 867 days at disposal.
Criminal Appeals
New filings for criminal appeals in 2016 are slightly higher compared to 2015. In 2016, 1,134 criminal appeals were filed as opposed to 1,119 in 2015.
Over the same period, there were 1,160 disposals, a 1% decrease from the 1,170 disposals in the previous year.
As at 31 December 2016, there were 135 [iii] active appeals compared to the previous year when there were 153 active appeals.
Footnotes criminal jurisdiction
[i] "Disposed cases" are defined having a final outcome, e.g. sentence, acquittal, dismissal, withdrawal, or joined to another case.
[ii] The cases that required a trial location decision generally are older than High Court direct committal cases as they are subject to some statutory timeframes before they reach the High Court. The statutory timeframe to case review for protocol cases is 84 days (60 working days) and the protocol decision is expected to be made shortly after case review (5-10 working days maximum).
[iii] Data is extracted from a live database. Late changes to information in the system may affect some statistics in the reports.
High Court civil jurisdiction – year ended 31 December 2016
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Note: Civil cases in this context include: general proceedings, judicial reviews, and originating applications. Insolvency cases are bankruptcy cases (where an adjudication application has been filed) and company liquidations. Civil appeals are matters in the civil jurisdiction appealed to the High Court from either the District Court (including the Family Court) or a tribunal. The reporting for the calendar year 2016 annual statistics does not include claims of historic abuse within state institutions. The significant majority of these cases are concluded by confidential settlement carried out with little input by the Court. They are excluded because they do not follow the normal process for progression through the Court. For this reason new business, disposal, and active case data for general proceedings in the calendar year 2016 annual statistics cannot be compared to annual statistics published prior to June 2012. |
This analysis compares figures as at 31 December 2016 and 31 December 2015.
Overview of whole of the civil jurisdiction
The number of new civil cases filed has increased by 4% from 2,510 last year to 2,602 this year. The increase is due to Christchurch earthquake general proceedings filed in anticipation of the potential effect of the Limitation Act 2010 time limits as the sixth anniversaries of the major Christchurch earthquakes approached.
Civil appeal filings also rose as a direct result of appeals filed against the Auckland Unitary Plan.
There were 2,360 civil cases disposed nationally, a 4% decrease compared to 2,456 cases disposed in the previous year.
The combined effect of the above resulted in 2,260 active civil cases on hand (awaiting hearing or judgment). This is a 12% increase compared to last year when there were 2,022 active civil cases.
General proceedings
General proceedings are most representative of a standard civil dispute brought to court. The top three types of general proceedings claims over the past 12 months were Christchurch earthquake related cases ("Natural disasters – Christchurch earthquakes” and “Building defects - Christchurch earthquakes”) at 26% of the claims filed and "Contractual Disputes" and "Debt Recovery" cases at 11% and 9% respectively.
There were 1,559 general proceedings filed during the year. This is a 3% increase compared to last year. In most centres filings fell, so this increase is the result of Christchurch earthquake related cases. There were 1,365 general proceedings that were disposed, a 10% decrease compared to previous year. There were 1,794 active general proceedings on hand (awaiting hearing or awaiting judgment) compared to 1,600 active general proceedings last year.
The median waiting time to trial for general proceedings cases which were active (waiting time is measured from the date the case was deemed ready for hearing to the future hearing date) was 286 days compared with 314 days for the previous year.
Insolvency proceedings
There were 2,705 cases filed this year compared to 2,543 cases last year. New filings began to increase from a 5-year low at January 2016. This has led to a 4% increase of active insolvency proceedings on hand (609 in 2015 to 633 in 2016).
Appeal proceedings
There were 362 civil appeals filed during the year which is a significant increase of 13% compared with the previous year. The increase is due to filing of appeals in respect of the Auckland Unitary Plan. As a result, the number of active civil appeals (awaiting hearing or judgment) was 247, an increase of 40% from 176 active appeals last year.
Statistics