Edwards, R. v

Where imprisonment for public protection is imposed for a serious specified offence, the sentencing court must still dispose of every other offence before it. Specified but non-serious offences require the extended-sentence regime, while non-specified offences may properly receive no separate penalty.

The minimum term for imprisonment for public protection may reflect the totality of all associated offending dealt with in the same proceedings. It need not be calculated only from the serious specified offence. Consecutive extended sentences are inappropriate alongside such an indeterminate sentence. The court must also stand back from individual notional sentences and ensure that their aggregate properly reflects totality, including proper credit for early guilty pleas.

The appellant pleaded guilty at an early stage in the Crown Court at Reading to grievous bodily harm with intent, possession of weapons, affrays, assault occasioning actual bodily harm, criminal damage, and related offences committed on two evenings in 2005.

The sentencing judge imposed imprisonment for public protection for grievous bodily harm with intent, with a minimum term of five years less 182 days on remand. She derived that term from notional determinate sentences totalling ten years, but imposed no sentences on the remaining counts.

The appeal concerned whether that sentencing structure was procedurally correct and whether the five-year minimum term was manifestly excessive.

1. Appeal allowed. The requirements for imprisonment for public protection were plainly met. The appellant’s dangerousness, offending history and risk justified an indeterminate sentence for grievous bodily harm with intent.

2. The sentencing judge nevertheless erred by imposing no disposal on the other counts. The specified but non-serious offences required extended sentences under section 227 of the 2003 Act. The non-specified offences also required a recorded disposal, which could properly be no separate penalty.

3. The court upheld the judge’s basic method of fixing the minimum term by reference to the totality of offending. Under Powers of Criminal Courts (Sentencing) Act 2000, section 82A(3)(a), the seriousness of the offence may be considered with associated offences. Offences dealt with in the same proceedings are associated under section 161. A minimum term for imprisonment for public protection can therefore reflect the aggregate notional determinate sentence, rather than only the serious specified offence.

4. Consecutive extended sentences were inappropriate alongside the indeterminate sentence. The required extended sentences were imposed concurrently with each other and with imprisonment for public protection.

5. The notional terms had been assessed too severely in aggregate. The judge had not sufficiently stood back to assess totality, and the ten-year notional total failed properly to reflect the early guilty pleas. A total of 12 years after contested trials, reduced to about eight years for the early pleas, was appropriate. The minimum term was accordingly reduced from five years to four years less 182 days.

6. The court imposed concurrent extended sentences totalling three years, comprising an 18-month custodial term and an 18-month extension period, for the affray and assault offences. No separate penalty was imposed for the remaining weapon and criminal-damage offences.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): Allowed the appeal against sentence and varied the sentencing order: [2006] EWCA Crim 3362.
• Crown Court at Reading: Imposed imprisonment for public protection with a five-year minimum term less time spent on remand, but made no disposal on the remaining counts.