Chapter 7 • The Right to a Fair Trial: Part II – From Trial to Final Judgement three years’ imprisonment for a drug offence, the Court concluded that “free legal assistance should have been afforded by reason of the mere fact that so much was at stake”.122 Since the alleged offence had occurred when the applicant was on probation, an additional factor was “the complexity of the case”, the domestic Court having “both to rule on the possibility of activating the suspended sentence and to decide on a new sentence”.123 Consequently, there was a breach of article 6(3)(c) of the Convention. The European Court has held, furthermore, that the manner in which article 6(1) and (3)(c)of the European Convention “... is to be applied in relation to appellate or cassation courts depends upon the special features of the proceedings involved; account must be taken of the entirety of the proceedings conducted in the domestic legal order and of the role of the appellate or cassation court therein”.124 The case of Granger, where legal aid had been refused, concerned appeal proceedings against a conviction for perjury following which the applicant was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment. As noted by the European Court, there could “thus be no question as to the importance of what was at stake in the appeal”.125 After having examined the proceedings before the appeal court, the European Court also found that the applicant had not been “in a position fully to comprehend the pre-prepared speeches submitted to” the High Court of Justiciary by the Solicitor General, “or the opposing arguments submitted to the court”, and that it was “also clear that, had the occasion arisen, he would not have been able to make an effective reply to those arguments or to questions from the bench”.126 As it turned out, one of the grounds for appeal “raised an issue of complexity and importance” that was in fact so difficult that the High Court had to adjourn its hearing “and called for a transcript of the evidence given at the applicant’s trial, so as to be able to examine the matter more thoroughly”.127 In the light of this situation, the European Court of Human Rights concluded that “some means should have been available to the competent authorities, including the High Court of Justiciary in exercise of its overall responsibility for ensuring the fair conduct of the appeal proceedings, to have the refusal of legal aid reconsidered”. In the view of the Court “it would have been in the interests of justice for free legal assistance to be given to the applicant” at least at the stage following the adjournment of the proceedings, since such a course “would in the first place have served the interests of justice and fairness by enabling the applicant to make an effective contribution to the proceedings”, and, secondly, would have enabled that Court to have “the benefit of hearing ... expert legal argument from both sides on a complex issue”.128 The Court concluded, consequently, that there had been a violation of article 6(3)(c) taken together with article 6(1) of the Convention. 122 Ibid., para. 33. 123 Ibid., para. 34. 124 Eur. Court HR, Case of Granger v. the United Kingdom, judgment of 28 March 1991, Series A, No. 174, p. 17, para. 44; emphasis added. 125 Ibid., p. 18, para. 47. 126 Ibid., loc. cit. 127 Ibid. 128 Ibid., para. 47 at p. 19. 278 Human Rights in the Administration of Justice: A Manual on Human Rights for Judges, Prosecutors and Lawyers