A couple charged with funding terrorism could be guilty of an offence even if they did not actually suspect their money would be used for terrorist purposes, the UK’s highest court has ruled.

Sally Lane, 56, and John Letts, 57, from Oxford, are due to stand trial at the Old Bailey for allegedly breaching section 17 of the Terrorism Act 2000. They are charged with sending money overseas, or arranging to do so, when they knew or had reasonable cause to suspect that it would or might be used for the purposes of terrorism.

In a unanimous judgment, five supreme court justices ruled that it was not a strict liability offence but nonetheless “an accused can commit this offence without knowledge or actual suspicion that the money might be used for terrorist purposes”.

The hearing revolved around the meaning of “reasonable cause to suspect”, which appears in section 17(b) of the Terrorism Act 2000.

Both the crown court trial judge and the court of appeal concluded that it was sufficient, based on information known to the accused, that “there exists, assessed objectively, reasonable cause to suspect that the money may be used for the purposes of terrorism.”

Lawyers for Lane and Letts argued that the offence ought be construed as “requiring an element of a guilty mind, mens rea,” and that “an accused must actually suspect that the money may be put to terrorist use”.

The offence of providing funding towards terrorism first appeared in the Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act 1976. Successive legislation has changed the crucial wording about knowledge and suspicion of what would happen to any funds.

In their decision, the supreme court justices said: “It is certainly true that because objectively assessed reasonable cause for suspicion is sufficient, an accused can commit this offence without knowledge or actual suspicion that the money might be used for terrorist purposes. But the accused’s state of mind is not, as it is in offences which are truly of strict liability, irrelevant.”

What was required for the offence to be proved, the justices said, was that “on the information available to the accused, a reasonable person would (not might or could) suspect that the money might be used for terrorism.”

They added: “The state of mind of such a person is, whilst clearly less culpable than that of a person who knows that the money may be used for that purpose, not accurately described as in no way blameworthy.



“It was for parliament to decide whether the gravity of the threat of terrorism justified attaching criminal responsibility to such a person, but it was clearly entitled to conclude that it did.



“It is normal, not unusual, for a single offence to be committed by persons exhibiting different levels of culpability. The difference in culpability can, absent other aggravating features of the case, be expected to be reflected in any sentence imposed if conviction results.”