The proviso in s 353(1) of the Criminal Law Consolidation Act 1935 (SA) applies to trials by judge alone, and the appeal court may have a sounder basis for applying it in such cases because the trial judge's reasoning is exposed to scrutiny. Statements made by a co-accused more than four months after the offence may not qualify as disclosing 'esoteric knowledge' where it cannot be established that the information was not publicly available by that time. A judge who sat on the appeal of a co-accused is not disqualified from sitting on the appeal of the other co-accused where the issues are entirely different.
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