Robber's rights were breached

A convicted armed robber from Wolverhampton has been awarded £1,000 in damages because police breached his human rights by secretly filming him.

Police resorted to secret filming when suspect Stephen Perry repeatedly refused to attend identity parades after having been arrested and bailed.

But judges at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg said the covert police video amounted to an interference with the suspect's right to respect for private life, guaranteed by the European Convention on Human Rights.

In addition to £1,000 damages, the judges awarded Mr Perry £7,000 in costs and expenses.

Identity parade

Mr Perry, 39, was arrested in April 1997 in connection with a series of armed robberies against minicab drivers in and around Wolverhampton.

He was released pending an identity parade, for which he failed to turn up.

When he failed to attend a series of further planned parades, police took video pictures of him covertly.

The footage was later inserted into a montage of film including Mr Perry and other people, to be shown to witnesses.

Prejudicial to defence

Two witnesses to the armed robberies identified Mr Perry from the compilation tape, but neither Mr Perry nor his solicitor was informed that the tape had been made or used.

He was convicted of robbery in March 1999 and jailed for five years.

On Thursday the European Court of Human Rights ruled that there was no indication that Mr Perry had any "expectation" that the video would be taken of him while he was in the police station for use in identification procedures and, potentially, as evidence prejudicial to his defence in his trial.

"That ploy adopted by the police went beyond the normal use of this type of camera and amounted to an interference with the applicant's rights to respect for his private life," said the judges.