R v Dominic Legg

When a person commits serious offences as a child but is sentenced after becoming an adult, the Children guideline remains relevant. The starting point is the sentence likely to have been imposed soon after the offending, but adult sentencing purposes and later evidence of continuing conduct, increased harm or dangerousness must also be considered. A more severe sentence requires good reason. Totality requires the aggregate sentence to be just and proportionate to the offending as a whole. Multiple victims do not automatically justify a substantial totality reduction. The age adjustment must be substantial, but it must not become excessive in light of the offender’s present circumstances and subsequent evidence.

Following a jury trial at the Crown Court at Teesside, Dominic Legg, aged 19 at sentence, was convicted in June 2024 of 13 serious sexual offences against three young female victims. Some offences were committed when he was himself a child. On 11 November 2024, the sentencing judge imposed five years and nine months’ detention in a young offender institution.

HM Solicitor General referred the sentence under section 36 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 as unduly lenient. Leave was granted. The challenge accepted the notional adult aggregate of 24½ years but contended that the reductions for the offender’s age and totality were excessive. The central issues were how to sentence a person who crossed age thresholds before sentence, and how totality should operate where serious offending involved three victims.

The Court allowed the Solicitor General’s reference. It accepted the judge’s offence-specific assessment of a notional adult aggregate of 24½ years, but held that the reductions for totality and age were excessive. The original sentences were quashed, except for the sentences relating to C’s offences other than rape, and were replaced so that the total sentence was eight years’ detention in a young offender institution.

1. Sentencing for childhood offending. The Children guideline remains relevant where an offender is sentenced after crossing a significant age threshold. The starting point is the sentence likely to have been imposed shortly after the offending. Where the offender is now an adult, the purposes of adult sentencing under the Sentencing Code must also be considered. A sentence more severe than the likely child sentence requires good reason; adulthood alone is insufficient. The Court followed the framework identified in R v Ahmed, Stansfield, Priestley, RW Hodgkinson [2023] EWCA Crim 281. Later events may show continuing conduct, greater culpability or greater harm.
2. Totality. The overall sentence must be just and proportionate to the offending as a whole. Totality is relevant to multiple offences against one victim, but multiple victims mean that the sentence must reflect the harm caused to each. A substantial reduction is not automatically required merely because terms for different victims are aggregated. In this case only a modest totality reduction from the notional adult sentence was justified.
3. Age and subsequent circumstances. The age reduction must be very substantial, but paragraph 6.46 of the guideline is only a rough guide and must not be applied mechanically. Emotional and developmental age and maturity are at least as important as chronological age. The enduring harm to the victims, the offender’s present assessment as dangerous, and the absence of the optimism that might have existed had he been sentenced as a child justified a less generous reduction. The reduction imposed was excessive and made the sentence unduly lenient. The judge’s decision not to impose an extended sentence, although unchallenged, was also relevant leniency.
4. Resentencing. Concurrent terms of eight years were imposed for the three rapes of B, seven years concurrently for the rape of C, and four years concurrently for each offence against A. The other sentences relating to C remained concurrent. All other orders made by the sentencing judge stood.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division), [2025] EWCA Crim 258: allowed the reference under section 36 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988, found the sentence unduly lenient, quashed the relevant sentences and substituted an aggregate sentence of eight years’ detention.
• Crown Court at Teesside: following conviction for 13 serious sexual offences, imposed five years and nine months’ detention on 11 November 2024.