Medway Council v Root (3)

In sentencing for contempt of court, the court must mark disapproval of disobedience and seek future compliance. Available options include no order, a fine, adjournment, immediate imprisonment and suspended imprisonment. Imprisonment is appropriate only where no reasonable alternative exists, and its length must bear a reasonable relationship to the statutory maximum and the seriousness of the breaches. The court must apply totality and take mitigation into account. A suspended custodial sentence may be imposed where immediate imprisonment is justified but mitigation and the circumstances make suspension proper, subject to conditions securing compliance with the underlying order.

Medway Council applied to commit Sara Jayne Root for breaches of an injunction restricting publication of care-proceedings material, an undertaking to remove Facebook material and refrain from further publication, and a reporting restriction order. The injunction had been made in 2011 and varied in 2012 and 2014. The Court of Appeal refused permission to appeal against the 2014 order in 2016.

In earlier judgments, the court found ten breaches of the injunction and further breaches of the undertaking and reporting restriction order. The sentencing issue was whether imprisonment was necessary and, if so, whether it should be immediate or suspended, having regard to the breaches, mitigation, proportionality and the need to secure future compliance.

1. Sentence. The court imposed an aggregate sentence of six months’ imprisonment. Three months for the injunction breaches ran concurrently. Three months for the breach of the undertaking by failing to remove material and making a further entry on 13 December 2016 ran consecutively. Other breaches ran concurrently or attracted no separate penalty.
2. Sentencing principles. The purposes of contempt sentencing were to mark disapproval of disobedience and to secure future compliance. The available options were no order, a fine, adjournment or deferral, immediate imprisonment and suspended imprisonment. The sentence had to bear a reasonable relationship to the maximum sentence of two years. Committal was appropriate only where no reasonable alternative existed, applying the guidance in Hale v Tanner [2000] 1 WLR 2377.
3. Assessment. The repeated and deliberate breaches, lack of compliance with the promise to remove the material, absence of genuine remorse and publication of deeply personal information were aggravating features. The court also considered the respondent’s health, financial circumstances, family situation, sincerity and the protracted history of the proceedings as mitigation.
4. Suspension. Although immediate imprisonment would have been justified, the court was just persuaded to suspend the six-month sentence for twelve months. Suspension was conditional on compliance with the injunction as varied. Any further proved breach would permit implementation of the custodial sentence.

The judgment describes earlier procedural steps in the same proceedings:

• High Court (Family Division): an injunction was made on 13 December 2011 and later varied on 11 June 2012 and 24 April 2014.
• Court of Appeal: permission to appeal against the 24 April 2014 order was refused on 28 July 2016.
• High Court (Family Division): the court found the breaches in judgments dated 17 and 18 July 2017 and imposed sentence in the present judgment.