Kirk v Spratley

A contempt sentence may be suspended by reference to the duration of the order whose breach gave rise to it, even where that order is indefinite. A fixed period of suspension remains preferable. An expired order cannot be retrospectively extended where it carries penal consequences. Any continuing restraint must be imposed by a fresh order, rather than by extending the lapsed order.

The defendants appealed against a committal order made by His Honour Judge Hull QC in the Epsom County Court on 9 April 2001. The order imposed suspended sentences of two months’ imprisonment for breaching an injunction made under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, which prohibited the defendants from keeping more than six dogs.

The injunction had expired on 27 January 2001. On 1 February 2001 the judge purported to extend it to August 2001 and later suspended the committal order subject to conditions requiring compliance. The issues were whether the suspension remained effective and whether the expired injunction could support continuing penal consequences.

1. The appeal was allowed and the second condition attached to the suspended committal order was deleted.

2. In Griffin v Griffin [2000] 2 FLR 302; [2000] 2 FLR 44, the court had held that a sentence for contempt could be suspended by reference to the duration of the order to which it was linked, even where that order might continue indefinitely. A fixed and finite suspension period remained preferable.

3. The committal order was defective because its suspension period had expired and the continuing condition was inconsistent with that express period. The valid condition requiring reduction of the number of dogs had not been alleged to have been breached.

4. More fundamentally, the order of 1 February 2001 could not validly extend the earlier injunction after it had lapsed. There had been an interval during which no order addressed to the defendants was in force, yet the purported extension exposed them to penal sanctions. The proper course would have been to make a fresh order under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997.

5. The court observed that a fresh application might produce a similar restriction and that breach of a civil order under the Act is also a criminal offence. The present committal therefore came to an end, without determining the outcome of any fresh application.

• Court of Appeal (Civil Division): allowed the appeal against the committal order made by His Honour Judge Hull QC in the Epsom County Court on 9 April 2001 and varied the order by deleting its second condition.