REGINA v REBECCA RESCORL

Where imprisonment is unavoidable, the decision whether to suspend the sentence remains a fact-sensitive assessment of whether immediate custody is necessary to achieve appropriate punishment. Sentencers must give proper weight to all personal mitigation, including genuine remorse, reparation and the impact of imprisonment on dependent children.

Caring responsibilities do not automatically justify suspension. However, the court must have clear and sufficient information about practical care arrangements before it can fairly assess the effect of imprisonment on innocent dependants. A custodial sentence may be suspended where the combined mitigating features make immediate custody unnecessary.

The appellant pleaded guilty in the Crown Court at Truro to fraud contrary to section 1 of the Fraud Act 2006. Over more than four years, she abused a trusted accounts role to obtain £50,000 from her employer. On 8 October 2021, HHJ Carr imposed 15 months’ immediate imprisonment after allowing credit for her guilty plea.

The appellant did not challenge the length of the sentence. She appealed, with permission, on the sole basis that it should have been suspended. The appeal focused on her mitigation, repayment of the full loss, and the practical and emotional consequences of imprisonment for her two dependent children.

1. Appeal allowed. The fraud was serious, crossed the custody threshold, and made a sentence of imprisonment unavoidable. The issue was whether that sentence had to take immediate effect.

2. The court emphasised that, when an offender has caring responsibilities, the sentencing court must obtain clear and sufficient information about the practicability of arrangements for dependent children. The offender cannot rely on a failure to arrange care as a reason to avoid immediate custody where it is necessary. Conversely, the impact on innocent children cannot be fairly assessed on inadequate or over-optimistic information.

3. The information before the sentencing judge about the children’s care was insufficient. Their father’s work commitments materially limited the care he could provide, while the pre-sentence report did not explain how the children would be cared for during imprisonment. Counsel and the court should have ensured fuller investigation of that important issue.

4. The judge had also given insufficient weight to the powerful combined mitigation: previous good character, remorse, personal difficulties, low risk of reoffending, the effect on the children, stable employment and repayment of the entire £50,000. Caring responsibilities were not an automatic reason for suspension, but immediate custody was not necessary to achieve appropriate punishment in these circumstances.

5. The court quashed the 15-month immediate custodial sentence and substituted 15 months’ imprisonment suspended for two years.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) — Allowed the appeal against sentence and, in [2021] EWCA Crim 2005, quashed the immediate custodial sentence and substituted a suspended sentence.
• Crown Court at Truro — On 8 October 2021, HHJ Carr sentenced the appellant to 15 months’ immediate imprisonment following her guilty plea to fraud.