The defendant had been convicted of breaching his sex offender’s order. He appealed his sentence of 2.5 years. The order had included a prohibition on being drunk in a public place and using abusive or insulting behaviour toward a female.
Held: The intention of the order was to prohibit conduct which might well not otherwise constitute a criminal offence but which gave rise to legitimate concern that it was the precursor to further sexual offending. This was the sixth breach. He had shown ‘a total disregard and lack of empathy for others, had no insight into his offending behaviour which he invariably denied and for which he took no personal responsibility.’ and ‘If the breach does not involve any real or obvious risk to that section of the public whom it is intended should be protected by the order, a community penalty which further assists the offender to live within the terms of the order may well be appropriate although repeated breaches will necessarily involve a custodial sentence if only to demonstrate that the orders of the court are not to be ignored and cannot be broken with impunity. Any breach which does create a real or obvious risk to those whom the order is intended to protect must inevitably be treated more seriously and multiple or repeated breaches may well justify sentences that might otherwise have been considered far higher than any specific criminal offence or misconduct would have attracted.’
Judges:
Moses LJ, Leveson J, Warwick McKinnon J
Citations:
[2006] EWCA Crim 2156
Links:
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Regina v Wilcox CACD 2003
The defendant appealed his sentence for breach of a sex offender’s order was to prohibit the offender (whose occupation was dealing with children’s party equipment) from remaining at a party after the equipment had been assembled. It was not . .
Cited – Braxton, Regina v CACD 21-May-2004
The defendant appealed a sentence of 3.5 years imprisonment for breach of an anti-social behaviour order.
Held: The sentence stood. What the offender might have considered trivial represented repeated breaches of an ASBO that had caused real . .
Cited – Regina v Lamb CACD 2005
The court heard an appeal against sentence for breach of an anti-social behaviour order, and considered the sentence in Braxton: ‘The vital distinction between that case and the circumstances with which we are concerned is that albeit the deliberate . .
Cited – Regina v Stevens and Lovegrove CACD 2-Feb-2006
The defendant appealed his sentence for breach of an anti-social behaviour order.
Held: The breach of an order was separate stand-alone offence for which the maximum penalty was five years imprisonment. It was not wrong in principle to impose . .
Cited – Page and Another, Regina v CACD 8-Dec-2004
The court considered the need for proportionate responses in sentencing to the particular offence before the court. . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Criminal Sentencing
Updated: 01 April 2022; Ref: scu.245045