When the Director of Public Prosecutions writes to a national newspaper and apologises for a prosecution failure in an individual case, you know that something significant went wrong. Before exploring that however, it might be thought a great pity that she chose to write to a newspaper and not the actual person wrongly accused of rape.

We talk a lot in the United Kingdom about the benefits of a jury trial, about how leaving the decision in the hands of 12 people chosen at random, is perhaps fairest way of determining justice. But how exactly does a jury decide?

‘Follow the money’ is a rather clichéd line from the film ‘All The President’s Men’ which charted the scandal that engulfed President Nixon in the 1970s.