A sentence of three-and-a-half years’ imprisonment was appropriate in the case of a 69-year-old man who had pleaded guilty to causing or inciting a child under 13 to engage in sexual activity and to sexual assault of a child under 13 after he had groomed and sexually assaulted a seven-year-old girl.
The court quashed a sentence of 14 months’ imprisonment imposed after an offender’s guilty plea to outraging public decency by taking video footage underneath women’s skirts without their knowledge. A community order with a requirement to attend a sex offender programme was more likely to lead to the offender’s rehabilitation than a custodial sentence and […]
A sentence of imprisonment for public protection with a minimum term of two years was appropriate in the case of an adult male who had pleaded guilty to attempting to foster an inappropriate relationship with an 11-year-old girl over internet.
An extended sentence was reduced on appeal to less than 30 months even though the offender had already served the sentence. The judge had imposed the lengthy extension period in order for the defendant to attend a sex offender treatment programme, but had not intended the consequence that the defendant would remain on the sex […]
An offence of sexual assault, although a bad offence within its category, did not justify the imposition of an extended sentence. A sentence of two years’ imprisonment was substituted.
Where offences in a case straddled different sentencing regimes, counsel for the prosecution and defence should inform the judge of the effect of those regimes.
A six-year extended licence period, imposed upon an offender who had pleaded guilty to four sexual assaults, was excessive. A four-year extended licence, equivalent to the appropriate custodial term, was therefore imposed.
A judge had not erred in adopting a 30-year starting point for the minimum term when sentencing a young offender to detention for life following his conviction for the murder of a 16-year-old girl, on the basis that the murder involved sexual or sadistic conduct and fell within the Criminal Justice Act 2003 Sch.21 para.5(2)(e), […]
The decision of R. v Smith (Nicholas) [2011] UKSC 37, [2011] 1 W.L.R. 1795 did not undermine the long-established practice that the assessment of dangerousness involved addressing the question whether or not an offender would be dangerous when he would otherwise be released from a determinate sentence; it underlined the principle that the decision whether […]
In a trial involving aggravated burglary and sexual offences a judge had fairly summed up the evidence and the convictions could not be said to be unsafe. However, the total sentence of 16 years was manifestly excessive and was reduced to 12 years’ imprisonment.
