R v Chinonye David Anyiam

When sentencing offences committed before other offences for which the offender has already been sentenced, the court must first identify the proper sentence for the instant offences. It then has a discretion to make further allowance for the earlier sentence after considering all the circumstances. The exercise is not a mechanical reconstruction of a single sentencing hearing followed by deduction of the earlier sentence.

The differing nature of the offences is relevant but not decisive. The court should also consider matters including temporal overlap, any benefit already received from concurrent sentences, and whether a notional set of consecutive sentences imposed together would require a downward adjustment to remain just and proportionate.

The appellant received concurrent sentences totalling 27 months’ imprisonment at Wood Green Crown Court for possessing a class B drug with intent to supply and offering to supply a class B drug. The judge ordered that term to run consecutively to an existing 30-month sentence for violent disorder and possession of a machete.

The drug offending covered a period which overlapped with the earlier offending. The appellant had also received concurrent terms for possessing criminal property and dangerous driving, committed during that period. He appealed on the ground that the fully consecutive sentence failed to give sufficient effect to totality.

1. Appeal dismissed. The aggregate sentence was neither disproportionate nor wrong in principle.

2. The court applied the Sentencing Council guideline on totality for offences committed before other offences for which sentence has already been imposed. The sentencing court must first determine the appropriate sentence for the instant offences, taking totality among those offences into account. It then has a discretion to decide whether a further allowance should be made for the earlier sentence, whether or not it has been served in full.

3. The required assessment is fact-sensitive. It is not a matter of treating the cases as if they had all been sentenced together and deducting the earlier sentence from that notional total. Relevant circumstances include the similarity of the offending, temporal overlap, any opportunity to clear the slate, the risk of an undeserved bonus, and whether a notional set of consecutive sentences would need adjustment to achieve a just and proportionate overall sentence.

4. The different character of the violent and weapons offending, as compared with the drug-supply offending, was relevant. It did not alone resolve totality. Here, however, the appellant had already received concurrent sentences for other offending within the same overall period. If all the matters had been sentenced together, the 30-month sentence for violent disorder and possession of a machete, the concurrent short sentences, and consecutive sentences for the drug offences would have made sufficient allowance for totality.

5. Accordingly, no further reduction was required from the 27-month sentence ordered to run consecutively.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) — dismissed the sentence appeal in [2023] EWCA Crim 846.

• Crown Court at Wood Green — on 18 January 2023 imposed concurrent 27-month sentences for the class B drug offences, consecutive to an existing 30-month sentence for violent disorder and possession of a machete.