Roberts, R. v

In sentencing a drugs conspiracy, an offender may properly be placed in the significant role category where the evidence establishes awareness and understanding of the operation beyond the very limited awareness characteristic of a lesser role. Financial gain is not indispensable to that categorisation.

Where the offender falls only just within the significant-role category, the sentence should be placed towards the bottom of the applicable guideline range. The court must then give proper effect to mitigating features, including a one-off offence, absence of relevant recent convictions, positive good character and genuine remorse.

The appellant pleaded guilty at the first available opportunity to conspiracy to supply cocaine. He had stored almost one kilogram of cocaine at his home as a favour to another conspirator. A third conspirator collected it for onward supply. The accepted basis of plea was that the appellant received no financial benefit and that his involvement ended on collection.

At Leicester Crown Court, the judge assessed Category 2 harm and a significant role under the Drug Offences Sentencing Guideline. A sentence of seven and a half years after a trial was reduced by one third for the guilty plea, producing five years’ imprisonment. The appellant appealed on the ground that the sentence was manifestly excessive.

1. The appeal was allowed. The five-year sentence was reduced to three years and six months’ imprisonment.
2. The sentencing judge was entitled to classify the harm as Category 2 because of the quantity of cocaine. The judge was also entitled to find that the appellant had a significant role, although only at the lower end of that category. The appellant’s possession, alone, of a large and valuable quantity of drugs supported an inference that he had more than very little awareness or understanding of the scale of the operation.
3. The accepted absence of financial gain did not prevent that conclusion. It did, however, make the sentencing judge’s finding that the appellant had acted for financial advantage inconsistent with the basis of plea.
4. The combination of Category 2 harm and a significant role produced a starting point of eight years and a range of six and a half to ten years’ imprisonment. Since the appellant was only just within the significant-role category, the sentence should have been moved towards the lowest end of the range. The high purity of the cocaine aggravated the offence, but this was a one-off incident and the appellant had no relevant recent convictions, positive good character and accepted remorse.
5. Those matters justified a sentence after trial of five years and three months. Applying the same one-third credit for the guilty plea produced a sentence of three years and six months.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): Allowed the appeal against sentence and reduced the sentence from five years to three years and six months’ imprisonment.
• Crown Court at Leicester: On 26 October 2017, sentenced the appellant to five years’ imprisonment for conspiracy to supply a Class A controlled drug.