Newport Law Courts, Isle of Wight

For the courthouse in South Wales, see Newport Crown Court.

Newport Law Courts, also known as the Isle of Wight Combined Court Centre, is a Crown Court venue which deals with criminal cases, as well as a County Court, which deals with civil cases, in Quay Street, Newport, Isle of Wight, England. It also accommodates the local magistrates' court.

Newport Law Courts
Newport Law Courts
Location	Quay Street, Newport, Isle of Wight
Coordinates	50°42′04″N 1°17′30″W / 50.7012°N 1.2916°W / 50.7012; -1.2916
Built	1994
Architect	Rainey Petrie Architecture
Architectural style(s)	Modernist style
Shown on the Isle of Wight

History

Until the early 1990s, criminal court trials were held in Newport Guildhall.^[1][2] However, as the number of court cases in Newport grew, it became necessary to commission a more modern courthouse for criminal matters. The site selected by the Lord Chancellor's Department had been occupied by a row of private houses: No. 1 Quay Street had been the home of Henry Mew, a director of the brewery, Mew Langton & Company. There was a bottling store at the back of the house,^[3][4] which was one of the support buildings for the main brewery building on The Quay.^[5][6]

The new building was designed by Rainey Petrie Architecture in the Modernist style, built in red brick at a cost of £3.4 million,^[7] and was completed in 1994.^[8] The design involved an asymmetrical main frontage of nine bays facing onto Quay Street. The third bay from the right, which, unlike the rest of the main frontage, was three storeys high rather than two storeys, featured a double-doorway with a stone architrave on the ground floor and a projecting triangular window spanning the first and second floors, all surmounted by a pediment with a Royal coat of arms in the tympanum. The second bay from the left contained an entrance in a similar style but the projecting triangular window only spanned the first floor. The other bays were fenestrated by square casement windows on the ground floor and by a mixture of casement and projecting triangular windows on the first floor. Internally, the building was laid out to accommodate four courtrooms.^[9]

Notable cases have been the trial and conviction of Graham Medway, in October 2020, for sex offences which included the rape of a three-year-old child.^[10][11][12]

References

1. "Regeneration Proposals for Newport Guildhall" (PDF). Isle of Wight Council. 1 July 2021. p. 18. Retrieved 17 March 2023.
2. Toms, Jan (2012). Isle of Wight Villains Rogues, Rascals and Reprobates. History Press. ISBN 978-0752482231.
3. "Ordnance Survey Map". 1914. Retrieved 17 March 2023.
4. "Kelly's Isle of Wight directory for Quay Street". 1904. Retrieved 17 March 2023.
5. "New ale launching in memory of Mew Langton Brewery – Hunt on for original recipe". On The Wight. 29 December 2016. Retrieved 17 March 2023.
6. "Beer fest a return to roots". Isle of Wight County Press. 10 March 2017. Retrieved 17 March 2023.
7. "Capital Building Programme". Hansard. 26 January 1996. Retrieved 17 March 2023.
8. Lloyd, David Wharton; Pevsner, Nikolaus (2006). Isle of Wight (Buildings of England Series). Yale University Peress. p. 178. ISBN 978-0300107333.
9. "Newport, Isle of Wight". Ministry of Justice. Retrieved 17 March 2023.
10. "Man admits raping girl, three, at Isle of Wight woods". BBC. 27 October 2020. Retrieved 17 March 2023.
11. "The reasons why Isle of Wight child rapist Graham Medway was jailed for nine years". Hampshire Live. 13 January 2021. Retrieved 17 March 2023.
12. "Jailed Isle of Wight child rapist sentenced for further offences". Isle of Wight County Press. 4 October 2022. Retrieved 17 March 2023.

External links

• Court information