[2025] EWCA Crim 1240

The first thing we wish to say is that we commend the experienced judge for his approach to this case. In dealing with a horrifying and dreadful case of this kind, a judge must maintain an objective and dispassionate approach. The judge's job is to apply the law to the facts of the case and to be fair to the person who is to be sentenced. That is not easy in a case such as this. As we have already said, the findings of fact which the judge made following his careful analysis of complicated evidence are unimpeachable. They are not criticised by anybody. Those findings enable us to assess the final result of this case in the way which we are now required to do. We express our gratitude to the judge for that.

The Solicitor General's first submission, in our judgment, has force. The aggravating factors which the judge identified clearly outweigh the impact of such mitigation as there is. It is always necessary for any court sentencing a young offender to remember their age and level of maturity, in particular where their life has included serious hardships which have left their mark on them.

We therefore do not approach this case on the basis that there is no mitigation; nor are we invited to do so. But even having regard to those matters we have just mentioned, the aggravating factors were, in our judgment, of greater weight than the mitigating factors.

It is right, as the judge said, that a starting point of 30 years is a high starting point for particularly serious offences. It therefore does incorporate many serious aggravating features which are common to offences of that very high degree of gravity, and it is important not to double count those factors. But, in the end, we consider that in approaching his difficult task, the judge did fall into error because we consider that, even having regard to the need to avoid double counting, the aggravating factors here were powerful. That conclusion is reinforced by what we have to say about the offender's conduct in feigning psychosis in a calculated, cynical and manipulative way in order to try to achieve an outcome which was unjust, in his favour.

That, in our judgment, was a serious aggravating factor and puts beyond doubt our judgment that the balance required an increase in the starting point above the level of 30 years.

In our judgment the appropriate sentence, before discount for the guilty plea, should have been 33 years.

What we have said about the offender's conduct in feigning psychosis in the way that the judge found that he had done also impacts on the appropriate level which he should have received for the late guilty plea. We consider that, in allowing a very substantial level of credit for the late plea, the judge did err in favour of undue leniency. We consider that we ought not to attempt to reflect our findings in relation to this case by means of some precise, arithmetically derived percentage. The way we propose to approach this is to say that the most credit which the late guilty plea truly deserved from that sentence of 33 years was two years. That results in a minimum term of 31 years, from which the days which had been spent on remand prior to sentence (501 days) will be deducted, as before.

That means that the Parole Board will be unable to consider the release of the offender until that period has elapsed. When it has elapsed, they will be able to consider his release; but he will not be released unless the Parole Board has decided that it is not longer necessary in the public interest for him to be detained. That decision will be taken having regard to the risk which he is said then to pose, and to how he has progressed during his sentence. No one today can predict what the outcome of those decisions will be. They will not fall to be made for a very long time indeed.

Accordingly, we grant the Solicitor General's application for leave to refer the sentence. We quash the sentence that was imposed in the court below and we impose a sentence of 31 years (less 501 days), which means that the offender will serve a sentence of 29 years and 229 days.