R v Connor Patrick Dillon

Whether a knife is highly dangerous under the Definitive Guideline is a fact-specific assessment. The fact that the knife was not recovered does not determine its category. The court may rely on evidence such as CCTV footage and photographs of injuries. Deliberate slashing at the face or head of several victims, together with a violent record and intoxication, may justify the top of the guideline range for a single offence. In this case, the sentence was not manifestly excessive.

The appellant pleaded guilty to three counts of assault occasioning actual bodily harm and one count of possessing a knife in a public place. The Crown Court at Manchester imposed a total sentence of two years’ imprisonment, including concurrent sentences and credit for the guilty plea. The appellant appealed with leave, arguing that the starting points were excessive, that the knife had been incorrectly categorised, and that totality had not been properly considered. The central issues were the proper categorisation of the knife and whether the resulting sentence was manifestly excessive.

The appeal was dismissed.

1. The Definitive Guideline requires the categorisation of a weapon as dangerous or highly dangerous to be determined by the facts and circumstances of the particular case. The absence of the knife itself does not determine the issue.
2. The court considered R v O’Bryan [2021] EWCA Crim 1472, where an unrecovered knife had been categorised as dangerous rather than highly dangerous. That decision did not require the same conclusion in every case involving an unrecovered knife. The CCTV footage and photographs of the injuries provided sufficient evidence to classify the knife here as highly dangerous.
3. The injuries also supported the view that the Crown had been generous in accepting harm category 3. Another court might have treated the offences as category A2, with a starting point of 18 months and a range extending to two and a half years.
4. Even accepting the more favourable A3 classification, the starting point was 36 weeks and the upper end of the range was 18 months. Deliberate slashing at the face and head of three victims, combined with the appellant’s history of violence and intoxication, justified a sentence at the top of the range for a single offence. The presence of three offences and three victims supported the overall sentence.
5. The Recorder had imposed concurrent three-year starting points for the assaults, reduced to two years to reflect the guilty plea, together with a concurrent sentence for possession of the bladed article. The sentence was not manifestly excessive.

1. Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): The appeal against sentence was dismissed.
2. Crown Court at Manchester: The Recorder imposed a total sentence of two years’ imprisonment for three assaults and possession of a knife in a public place.
3. Bolton Magistrates’ Court: The appellant pleaded guilty and was committed to the Crown Court for sentence.