Attorney General's Reference No. 95 of 2009 (Blight)

An offender who uses a knife to inflict serious injury will normally receive imprisonment measured in years. That general approach does not prevent a sentencing court from recognising truly exceptional circumstances that place a case outside sentencing guidelines. Serious provocation, an attack and threatened violence in the offender’s home, and an intention initially directed to disarming an assailant may justify a merciful sentence where the overall circumstances are exceptional.

A suspended sentence of imprisonment cannot exceed 12 months. An unlawful longer suspended term must be reduced to the statutory maximum while preserving the otherwise appropriate elements of the order.

The offender pleaded guilty in the Crown Court at Teesside to wounding with intent, contrary to section 18 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861. During a violent confrontation at his home, the victim attacked him with an axe, made threats, and continued to challenge him outside. The offender took a knife into the garden, intending to disarm the victim, and inflicted one very serious stab wound.

The sentencing judge imposed two years’ imprisonment suspended for two years, with supervision. The Attorney General sought to refer the sentence as unduly lenient under section 36 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988. The offender also appealed because a suspended custodial term could not lawfully exceed 12 months.

1. The Attorney General’s application for leave to refer the sentence as unduly lenient was refused. The offender’s appeal was allowed solely to correct the unlawful length of the suspended custodial term.

2. Wounding with intent involving a knife and grave injury ordinarily requires a substantial immediate sentence measured in years. Nevertheless, the court held that this was an exceptional case, falling outside ordinary sentencing guidelines. The offender was a man of good character who had been attacked and injured with an axe in his own home, subjected to serious threats, and provoked into acting during a dangerous and frightening confrontation.

3. The sentencing judge was entitled to treat the offender’s initial purpose in taking the knife as an attempt to disarm the victim and bring the confrontation to a peaceful end. Although the single stab caused grave and lasting injury, the overall circumstances justified a humane and merciful sentence within the appropriate range.

4. The two-year suspended term was unlawful because the maximum term capable of suspension was 12 months. It was reduced to 12 months’ imprisonment, suspended for two years. The two-year supervision order and remaining parts of the order were unchanged.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): Refused the Attorney General’s application under section 36 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988, holding that the sentence was not unduly lenient. Allowed the offender’s appeal only to reduce the unlawful suspended term to 12 months: [2010] EWCA Crim 353.

• Crown Court at Teesside: On 19 October 2009, imposed two years’ imprisonment suspended for two years, with a two-year supervision order, following a guilty plea to wounding with intent.