R v Stuart Pitman

A discretionary life sentence for a dangerous offender remains a sentence of last resort. It may nevertheless be necessary and proportionate where the offender presents a serious and indiscriminate risk of violence, the reduction of that risk is unpredictable, and there is no reliable basis for expecting effective engagement with treatment or abstinence.

In applying sentencing guidelines, an assault may properly be treated as persistent despite its short duration where it continues after the victim is felled and escalates through the use of a weapon. A court may also correct a sentencing record to identify the statutory power actually used, but cannot correct a minimum term if doing so would unlawfully increase the sentence.

The appellant was convicted at the Crown Court at Nottingham of causing grievous bodily harm with intent following an unprovoked prison attack on a fellow inmate. He used his fists and then a concealed improvised bladed weapon, causing serious facial injuries, fractures and lacerations.

Having found him dangerous, the judge imposed a discretionary life sentence on the basis of a notional determinate sentence of eight years and stated a minimum term of five years and three months. The appellant appealed, contending principally that a life sentence was neither necessary nor proportionate and that an extended sentence should have been preferred. He also challenged the guideline categorisation of the offence.

The central issue was whether the judge had been entitled to conclude that the appellant’s continuing risk to the public required a life sentence.

1. Appeal dismissed. The judge was entitled to categorise the offence as category A3. The assault was persistent because it continued after the victim had been knocked to the ground and escalated from punches to slashing with an improvised weapon. Its duration of about 45 seconds did not prevent that conclusion. The weapon’s manufacture and concealment in prison also justified the finding of significant planning.

2. The judge had carefully considered the appellant’s background, the pre-sentence report and the psychiatric evidence before finding that he met the statutory dangerousness criteria. She was entitled to regard the risk as serious and indiscriminate. The appellant had continued to use drugs and had not engaged with interventions during an already substantial custodial sentence for similar violence. It was therefore impossible reliably to predict whether, or when, his risk would be reduced.

3. The court accepted the principle in Attorney-General’s Reference No 27 of 2013 (R v Burinskas & Ors) [2014] EWCA Crim 334 that a life sentence is a last resort. On these facts, however, the judge was fully entitled to conclude that an extended sentence did not provide a sufficient and proportionate response and that life imprisonment was required.

4. The court directed correction of the court extract to show that the discretionary life sentence had been imposed under section 285 of the Sentencing Act 2000, rather than section 274. It could not correct the stated minimum term because that would unlawfully increase the sentence.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): In [2025] EWCA Crim 116, dismissed the appeal against the discretionary life sentence and directed correction of the court extract to record section 285 of the Sentencing Act 2000.
• Crown Court at Nottingham: On 26 October 2023, the appellant was convicted of causing grievous bodily harm with intent. On 26 February 2024, he was sentenced as a dangerous offender to discretionary life imprisonment, with a stated minimum term of five years and three months.