Letter: Bailed out with a glass of water

Sir: The reports about the judge in the Asil Nadir case bring to mind a fictional precedent. The late Judge Harry Leon, who wrote under the pseudonym of Henry Cecil, had a very simple way of ridding a case of a judge.

In one of his novels he tells of how a rogue feared the judge who was going to try his case. He was on bail and the weekend before his trial saw him feigning illness outside the judge's home: he is taken in and the judge gives him a glass of water. On the Monday, when the judge sees the same man in the dock, he recognises him and has no alternative but to withdraw from the case.

Yours faithfully,

J. MERVYN PUGH

Fernhill Heath, Worcester

5 July