REGINA v JOHN E

Historic misconduct evidence may support a complainant’s credibility where it is directly relevant to a disputed background issue, can be challenged by the defendant, and is accompanied by a clear limiting direction. Its admission will not make convictions unsafe where it causes no significant unfair prejudice and the prosecution case has other evidential support.

In sentencing for an exceptionally serious, prolonged campaign of sexual offending, an appellate court will not interfere where the sentencing judge has properly assessed culpability and harm, avoided double-counting, and applied totality. An extended licence period should be attached to a specified sentence rather than imposed globally.

The appellant was convicted at the Crown Court at Basildon of multiple sexual offences against his two stepdaughters, committed between 2007 and 2017, contrary to the Sexual Offences Act 2003. He received an extended determinate sentence of 30 years, comprising 24 years’ custody and a six-year extended licence period.

His renewed application for leave to appeal conviction challenged two evidential rulings. The first admitted a police database record concerning his 1997 cannabis offending. The second excluded evidence about a memory card attributed to a witness, Z. His sentence appeal alleged that the custodial term was manifestly excessive.

1. The court refused the renewed application for leave to appeal conviction and dismissed the appeal against sentence. It corrected the technical error in the sentence by attaching the six-year extended licence period to the 24-year sentence on count 13.

2. The circumstances recorded in relation to the appellant’s 1997 cannabis conviction were relevant to C2’s credibility on the disputed issue of cannabis cultivation in the loft. If true, they made it less likely that she had fabricated that feature of her account. The evidence was not unfairly prejudicial: the appellant could, and did, dispute it, his cannabis-related convictions and cautions were in any event before the jury, and the jury received a limiting direction.

3. The court held that the evidence did not arguably render the convictions unsafe. There was other evidence supporting the prosecution case on cultivation, including C2’s evidence and contemporaneous diary records. The loft issue was important background but neither central nor determinative. The position was distinguishable from R v Smith [2020] 2 Cr.App.R 27, where the evidence had been highly prejudicial.

4. The excluded material concerning Z had only tenuous relevance. The chronology made a suggested attempt by Z to deflect blame difficult to understand, and the defence was able to explore both alleged antipathy and the absence of the memory card said to have been supplied to police.

5. The sentencing judge had correctly found dangerousness, avoided double-counting and applied totality. The offending was an exceptionally serious campaign over more than a decade, committed within a controlling and coercive household regime and causing devastating harm. R v S [2016] EWCA Crim 2058 gave no significant assistance because its facts, including the offender’s age, guilty plea and poor health, materially differed. A 24-year custodial term was not manifestly excessive.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) — refused the renewed application for leave to appeal conviction and dismissed the sentence appeal: [2022] EWCA Crim 80.
• Crown Court at Basildon — convicted the appellant on 15 December 2020 of multiple sexual offences and imposed an extended determinate sentence of 30 years.