Hancox & Anor v R.

A Serious Crime Prevention Order may be made following conviction only where there are reasonable grounds to believe that it will protect the public by preventing, restricting or disrupting the defendant’s involvement in serious crime. This requires a real or significant future risk, rather than a bare possibility.

The order is preventive, not punitive. Its terms must serve the statutory purpose and be proportionate to the risk. They must also be practicable, enforceable, precise and certain. A sentencing judge, not the probation service, makes the ultimate assessment of future risk. Restrictions on communications or equipment require particular justification and must be tailored to the offending and anticipated risk.

Eight men, including Dennis Hancox and Michael Duffy, pleaded guilty to conspiracies to produce substantial quantities of counterfeit sterling and euro banknotes. At Snarebrook Crown Court, the judge imposed Serious Crime Prevention Orders under the Serious Crime Act 2007 in addition to sentence.

Hancox, who received a suspended sentence because of age and ill health, contended that there was no material future risk. Duffy, who received immediate imprisonment, challenged the need for a five-year order and its communications-notification conditions. Both also relied on probation assessments describing the risk of reconviction as low.

The central issue was whether the statutory threshold of future serious-crime risk was met and whether the individual restrictions were proportionate.

1. Appeals dismissed. The court’s appellate jurisdiction was one of review. It would quash or vary an order only if it was wrong or unjust following a serious procedural or other irregularity.
2. Under section 19(2) of the Serious Crime Act 2007, a Crown Court is concerned with future risk. There must be a real or significant risk, rather than a bare possibility, that the defendant will commit further serious offences in England and Wales. An order is not an additional punishment and cannot be imposed because the defendant deserves it.
3. The order’s terms must be directed to the statutory purpose and proportionate. The court applied the principles in R v Mee, [2004] 2 Cr App R (S) 81. The interference with freedom of action must be justified by the public-protection benefit, and each restriction must be commensurate with the risk. The requirements of Article 8 were assessed in accordance with the framework explained in EB (Kosovo) v SSHD, [2008] UKHL 41.
4. Preventive-order terms must be practicable, enforceable, precise and certain, as explained in Boness, [2005] EWCA Crim 2395. A defendant and an enforcing police officer must be able readily to identify what conduct is prohibited.
5. The judge was entitled to find a material future risk in Hancox’s case. His age and serious medical conditions did not prevent his recent active involvement in counterfeiting and related offending. The probation assessment did not bind the judge, whose assessment had to take account of all the evidence.
6. The restrictions on equipment and notification were tailored to the defendants’ roles and were proportionate. The mobile telephone and internet-service-provider conditions imposed on Duffy were not standard conditions for SCPOs, but were justified by his communications role and risk of future offending. Any further investigation of his communications would require separate authorisation under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division). Dismissed both appeals against Serious Crime Prevention Orders.
• Snarebrook Crown Court. Following guilty pleas to counterfeiting conspiracies, imposed Serious Crime Prevention Orders on both defendants in addition to sentence.