Salt, R. v

Sentencing for breach of sex-offender notification requirements must reflect the actual gravity of each breach and its connection with the protective purpose of the notification regime. An undisclosed stay at a household containing children was highly serious, but the undisclosed opening of an ISA was at the low end of culpability and should not disproportionately increase the overall sentence.

Where a further offence is committed during the operational period of a suspended sentence order, Criminal Justice Act 2003, Schedule 12, paragraph 8(2) requires the court formally to deal with that order. The court must activate it, wholly or in a reduced term, unless activation would be unjust in all the circumstances, for which reasons must be given.

The appellant pleaded guilty at Lincoln Crown Court to four offences of failing to comply with notification requirements under the Sexual Offences Act 2003. Two offences concerned undisclosed bank accounts and use of an alias. Two concerned overnight stays at a Wakefield address occupied by a young man and several children, without notifying the authorities.

On 16 November 2017 the Crown Court imposed concurrent sentences of three years’ imprisonment. The appellant appealed against sentence with leave of the single judge. The appeal raised whether the judge had properly assessed the relative seriousness of the banking and address-notification breaches, and whether the suspended sentence orders had been dealt with lawfully.

1. Appeal allowed. The sentences of three years’ imprisonment were quashed. Concurrent sentences of two and a half years’ imprisonment were substituted for the two address-notification offences. Concurrent sentences of nine months’ imprisonment were substituted for the banking offences, concurrent with the two-and-a-half-year sentences.

2. The court agreed that the failures to report overnight stays at a household containing children were by far the more serious offences. The appellant’s record of repeated non-compliance, lack of remorse, dishonest conduct and assessed sexual risk made immediate custody and a substantial sentence necessary. The protective notification regime was important to public safety, even though no actual harm had occurred.

3. However, the sentence judge had allowed the banking offences and the suspended sentence orders to exert too much influence on the starting point for the children-indictment offences. The undisclosed opening of an ISA was technically within the notification requirements, but was at the lowest end of culpability because it was not a useful means of achieving the culpable purposes at which the financial-notification requirement was directed. The sentencing court should have evaluated that breach before treating it as aggravation.

4. The judge had also erred by dealing with the suspended sentence orders only informally. Paragraph 8(2) of Schedule 12 to the Criminal Justice Act 2003 was prescriptive. It required a formal decision whether to activate each order in full or in a reduced term, unless that would be unjust in all the circumstances and reasons were stated. The Court of Appeal activated both suspended sentences but ordered them concurrent with the substituted sentences, giving effect to the judge’s intended overall result without increasing the appellant’s punishment.

5. A starting point of three and a half years for the address-notification offences was excessive. With appropriate reduced credit for the late guilty pleas, concurrent terms of two and a half years were sufficient and proportionate.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): Allowed the appeal against sentence and substituted concurrent terms of two and a half years’ imprisonment for the address-notification offences and nine months for the banking offences.
• Lincoln Crown Court: On 16 November 2017 imposed concurrent sentences of three years’ imprisonment for four offences of failing to comply with notification requirements.