Richard Lee Norris v R

Sentencing Act 2020, Schedule 21 provides illustrative, rather than exhaustive, aggravating and mitigating factors for murder sentencing. A judge may therefore consider other matters relevant to seriousness, but must assess their actual weight on the facts.

Attempting to blame another person for an offence does not itself aggravate sentence. It may do so where it hinders the investigation or causes others to suffer. Disposing of evidence, targeting a victim at home, and attacking a sleeping victim may aggravate seriousness. The Schedule 21 exercise is fact-specific and not an arithmetical calculation from the statutory starting point.

The appellant was convicted at the Crown Court at Lincoln of murdering Marcus Tott, who was asleep in his home. The appellant had taken a knife to the address and inflicted a single fatal stab wound.

He received life imprisonment with a minimum term of 27 years. The sentencing judge adopted the 25-year starting point under Schedule 21 to the Sentencing Act 2020 and increased it for aggravating factors.

With permission from the Single Judge, the appellant challenged the uplift. The central issue was whether the aggravating factors, viewed against the mitigation, made the 27-year minimum term manifestly excessive.

1. Appeal dismissed. The minimum term of 27 years was severe but not manifestly excessive.
2. Schedule 21 to the Sentencing Act 2020 contains non-exhaustive examples of aggravating and mitigating matters. Applying R v Last [2005] EWCA Crim 106, the court held that a sentencing judge may consider unlisted matters where they are relevant to the seriousness of the murder.
3. The judge had erred by treating the appellant’s attempt to blame Petra Ross as aggravating. Under R v Lowndes [2014] 1 Cr App R (S) 75, a lie about another’s involvement does not aggravate sentence merely because it forms part of the defence. It may be material where it hinders the investigation or causes another person to suffer. Neither consequence arose here.
4. The remaining aggravating factors were properly available. The appellant’s old and less serious relevant convictions had limited weight. Disposal of the knife was aggravating, although the unsophisticated attempt carried limited weight. The victim’s home was a place where he was entitled to feel safe, and this reflected culpability. A sleeping victim was defenceless and highly vulnerable; the temporary nature of that vulnerability did not reduce the attacker’s culpability.
5. The mitigation was insubstantial. The lack of recent violence had some weight, but the absence of sophistication, the appellant’s belief that the victim had mistreated another person, and the single blow did not materially reduce seriousness. Following the approach in R v Jones [2005] EWCA Crim 3115, the court stressed that applying Schedule 21 is a fact-specific evaluative judgment, not an arithmetical exercise. The combined aggravation justified an uplift from the 25-year starting point.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): Dismissed the appeal against sentence and upheld the life sentence with a 27-year minimum term: [2024] EWCA Crim 68.
• Crown Court at Lincoln: On 16 June 2023, convicted the appellant of murder. On 19 June 2023, imposed life imprisonment with a minimum term of 27 years, less time spent on remand.