The Sentencing Guidelines Council, an independent body established to frame sentencing and allocation guidelines for the criminal courts, is publishing its first draft guidelines today. The Council is required by statute to consult Parliament and, among others, the Home Secretary, before publishing final guidelines and circulating them to the courts.

The draft guidelines draw heavily on comprehensive Advice submitted to the Council by the Sentencing Advisory Panel. The Panel is an independent body that has considerable experience of producing advice on sentencing issues to the Court of Appeal. The Panel consulted widely and sought the views of practitioners, academics, organisations and the wider general public before submitting its proposals to the Council.

When considering its proposals in relation to the new sentencing structure introduced by the Criminal Justice Act 2003, the Panel departed from its established practice of issuing a written consultation. This was the first time that the Panel had considered legislative provisions in advance of their implementation. Recognising the benefits of close co-operation with a broad spectrum of practitioners in the criminal justice system, it conducted a series of five day-long seminars at various venues around the U.K. These proved to be highly successful and enabled the Panel to produce a comprehensive list of well-researched and robust recommendations to the Council.

The Advice of the Panel on both guideline topics, which has been broadly accepted by the Council, is also being published today.

The subjects covered by the two guidelines are:

• Seriousness & New Sentences: Criminal Justice Act 2003
• Reduction in Sentence for a Guilty Plea

These are the first in a series of guidelines that the Council plans to issue with a view to improving consistency of approach to sentencing decisions in all criminal courts.

The Council is keen to ensure that sentencers and practitioners have comprehensive guidance that will guide them through the complexities of the sentencing decision and enable them to deal confidently, fairly and consistently with all offenders.

Seriousness & New Sentences: Criminal Justice Act 2003

This guideline is divided into two separate, but closely connected, sections:

Part 1 covers the general overarching principle of ‘seriousness’.

The assessment of seriousness is critical to and underpins the sentencing decision in each individual case. Sentencers must not only consider the level of harm caused or risked by an offence but must also assess the level of criminal culpability of the offender.

The guideline identifies a number of aggravating and mitigating factors of general application to criminal offences that can increase or diminish the culpability of the offender or the harm caused or risked. It also guides sentencers in deciding whether the thresholds for imposing community or custodial sentences have been passed.

Part 2 provides sentencers at all levels with structured and practical guidance on the new sentencing framework introduced by the Criminal Justice Act 2003.

Only those sentences and related provisions in the Act that are expected to come into force by April 2005 are covered by the guideline and further guidelines will follow in due course.

The key messages in the guideline are:

The new ‘flexible’ community sentence:

• The decision relating to the precise nature of a community sentence should be based upon the seriousness of the offence and the suitability of the offender to comply with requirements;
• There should be three sentencing ranges (based upon the seriousness of the offence) where the content of the sentence is guided by:

  (i) the purpose of sentencing that the sentencer is seeking to achieve;
  (ii) the risk of the offender committing further offences; and
  (iii) the ability of the offender to comply with the requirements.

• The court should seek to give credit in all cases for time spent on remand; and
• Where an order is breached, the primary objective should be to ensure that the order of the court is complied with and the purpose of the order is achieved.

Custodial sentences of 12 months or more:

• For those offenders who commit a violent or sexual offence specified in the Act and who present a substantial risk of serious harm, the court will have special sentences designed to protect the public. For other offenders sentenced to 12 months imprisonment or more, the first half of the sentence will be served in custody, the second half under supervision in the community;
• The second half of the sentence will be more onerous than now because it will be served in full in the community and the offender will be required to comply with requirements imposed on release;
• Future offence guidelines will be based on a sentence served in this way but current guidelines are based on existing provisions. When using current guidelines, courts should consider reducing the overall length of the sentence, but the reduction should be no more than one quarter;
• The sentencing court may suggest suitable interventions when passing sentence, but the Probation service has the ultimate responsibility for determining the conditions attached to a prisoner's release from detention;

Suspended sentences:

• The custodial term should be the same as that which would be given for an immediate custodial sentence;
• The operational period of a suspended sentence should reflect the length of the sentence being suspended;
• Any requirements imposed as part of the suspended sentence should be less onerous than those imposed as part of a community sentence.

Intermittent custody:

• The sentence should be considered for all offenders and applied in such a way as to limit discrimination;
• Intermittent custody should only be imposed if a custodial sentence of less than 12 months is justified and neither a community sentence nor suspended sentence is appropriate;
• The primary considerations when deciding whether intermittent custody is appropriate are:

(i) public safety;
(ii) offender suitability; and
(iii) sentence availability.

• In view of the demands on the offender of serving a sentence intermittently, the overall length of the sentence should be less than if it were to be served in full immediately;
• It might be appropriate to impose an additional requirement such as a curfew or exclusion requirement.

Deferred sentences:

• These sentences should predominantly be reserved for cases that are close to the community sentence or custody thresholds;
• In such cases the court will be able to allow the offender to demonstrate his commitment before sentence by fulfilling undertakings given to the court. If that happens, the court will be able to impose a lesser sentence;
• The undertakings will be supervised and the court will intervene before the end of the deferment period if they are not being complied with.

 

Reduction in Sentence for a Guilty Plea

This provides a structured approach to the principle that the length of a custodial sentence should be reduced where an offender pleads guilty at an early stage in the proceedings.

A guilty plea has the following benefits for victims and the criminal justice system as a whole. It:

• ensures a person who has committed an offence is sentenced without the need for a trial;
• shortens the gap between charge and sentence;
• saves victims and witnesses from the distress of having to give evidence and
• saves considerable cost.

The guideline states the purpose of the reduction, recommends a practical approach for sentencers to follow and sets out levels of reduction appropriate to the stage at which a guilty plea is entered.

 

Notes to Editors

1. The Sentencing Guidelines Council first met on 5th March 2004 (press notice CJS 002/2004 New Body To Improve Sentencing Practice). The Council is an independent and expert body that aims to give authoritative guidance on sentencing and will produce comprehensive sentencing guidelines to guide every criminal court in sentencing offenders.

2. The Council is chaired by the Lord Chief Justice, with seven other members from the judiciary and four members who between them bring experience of policing, criminal prosecution, criminal defence, and the interests of victims of crime. Judicial members were appointed by the Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs. The non-judicial appointments were made by the Home Secretary.

3. The other members of the Council are Lord Justice Christopher Rose (Deputy Chairman), Lord Justice Paul Kennedy (appointed following the sudden death of Lord Justice John Kay), Mr Justice Peter Crane, HH Judge Peter Beaumont, HH Judge Michael Mettyear, Judge Timothy Workman, Ms Malathy Sitaram JP, Anthony Edwards (Solicitor), Kenneth Macdonald QC (Director of Public Prosecutions), Chief Constable Peter Neyroud, and Ms Teresa Reynolds. Meetings of the Council will also be attended by the Chief Executive of the National Offender Management Service, Martin Narey and by the Chairman of the Sentencing Advisory Panel, Professor Martin Wasik.

4. At present, sentencing guidelines do not exist for all offences. For the more serious offences (e.g. burglary, rape, serious drug offences, fraud, causing death by dangerous driving), the Court of Appeal has issued guideline judgments which, in recent years, have been based on comprehensive Advice from the Sentencing Advisory Panel. The Council is working to produce a compendium of existing guideline cases. For the less serious cases that are dealt with in Magistrates’ Courts, the Magistrates’ Association has for many years issued the Magistrates’ Courts Sentencing Guidelines, latest edition 2004, and most Magistrates’ Courts have adopted these.

5. Where formal guidelines do not currently exist, courts sentencing for a particular offence can, and should continue to, look to similar cases that have been heard by the Court of Appeal and study the pattern and level of sentencing.

6. The Crime and Disorder Act 1998 established the Sentencing Advisory Panel. The Panel is chaired by Professor Martin Wasik and the other current members are Professor Andrew Ashworth QC (Hon), Lord Chan MBE, HH Sir Rhys Davies QC, Mrs Anne Fuller OBE JP, Ms Heather Harker, Professor Frances Heidensohn, HH Judge Peter Jones, David Mallen Esq CBE, Michael Morgan, Judge Howard Riddle, John Staples, Ms Joan Webster QPM and Christopher Woolley.

7. The Panel assists the Council by researching and considering the basis for levels of sentencing for particular offences and recommending guidelines. The Panel now has a wider remit (set out in the Criminal Justice Act 2003, section 171) and it can give advice that covers any particular matter affecting sentencing in addition to issues specific to individual offences.

8. All courts will be required to take into account the guidelines issued by the Council and to give reasons for departing from them (in accordance with Criminal justice Act 2003, section 172, in force with effect from 27th February 2004).

9. The Council will continue to benefit from the wide consultation undertaken by the Sentencing Advisory Panel which involve both practitioners, the academic community and the wider public. The consultation process has been expanded to enable Parliament and Ministers to contribute at the draft guideline stage, although the final decision rests with the Council.