Does the Crown have an obligation to cross-examine the accused before making the allegation?

As noted in preceding para. 176, a suggestion of recent contrivance arising implicitly from the evidence opens the way for an accused to lead rebuttal evidence of previous consistent statements during his or her direct testimony in anticipation of the allegation of concoction being made. Such a backdrop of implicit fabrication should not, however, relieve the Crown from its obligation to give the affected party a chance to explain if it intends to make the implicit suggestion explicit by a subsequent accusation of contrivance. There appears to be no good reason to absolve the Crown of its obligation to have cross-examined before making an allegation during the closing of the proceedings, as it did in this case, when the accused will have no chance to respond just because he or she had not availed of the opportunity to challenge the implication of concoction through his or her direct testimony, even if the suggestion of fabrication is implicit from the evidence of the witnesses who had testified. The essence of the rule in Browne v. Dunn is that an accused must know his or her credibility is being challenged. As already noted, this is particularly imperative when the challenge takes the form of a recent fabrication which has such potential to irretrievably impair credibility.