R v Nguyen Minh

In an appeal against sentence for cannabis production, role categorisation under the sentencing guideline is fact-specific. Helping to set up or dismantle an operation may indicate greater culpability than tending plants, particularly where the operation is substantial and the defendant performs an operational or management function rather than a bottom-of-chain task. The appellate question is whether the sentence is manifestly excessive, not whether the appellate court would have made the same assessment. A trial judge who heard the evidence is well placed to assess involvement. The sentence may be upheld where the judge’s starting point and reductions produce a term within, or below, the relevant guideline range, even if the categorisation could have been explained more fully.

After a six-day trial at Bradford Crown Court, the appellant was convicted of producing cannabis and sentenced to two years’ imprisonment. The parties had agreed that the case fell within the category 2 lesser-role guideline range, with a one-year starting point. The sentencing judge instead treated the appellant and his co-defendants as having significant roles, adopted a three-year starting point and reduced it to two years for previous good character.

The appeal alleged that the role was wrongly categorised and that the judge had acted unfairly by not inviting submissions on departure from the agreed categorisation. A separate ground concerning prevalence was abandoned. The central issue was whether the sentence was manifestly excessive.

Appeal dismissed. The ground based on prevalence was not pursued and required no separate determination.

1. The cited sentencing authorities were fact-specific. The court accepted that a person who helps to set up an operation of this kind may be more culpable than a person whose role is to tend the plants, although the assessment remains fact-sensitive. R v Thuan van Vu [2014] EWCA Crim 561 concerned a significantly larger operation and a defendant treated as lesser role because he was a gardener, so it offered limited assistance on the present facts.
2. It would have been preferable for the sentencing judge to explain more fully how the guideline factors made the roles significant. The controlling appellate question, however, was whether the sentence was manifestly excessive. The challenge was in substance to the judge’s assessment of the evidence. Having presided over the trial, he was well placed to assess the appellant’s involvement and had treated him as having an operational or management function within a chain.
3. The scale of the operation and the appellant’s participation as part of a team showed that he was not at the bottom of the chain of command. The evidence accepted for the appeal showed involvement in setting up the operation. The judge started below the four-year starting point for a significant role and reduced the sentence for previous good character to two years. Even on the lesser-role categorisation, the court could have reached the same sentence by moving up from the one-year starting point. The sentence was therefore not manifestly excessive.

The appeal was dismissed.

1. Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) — The appeal against sentence was dismissed on 2 July 2026: [2026] EWCA Crim 1019 .
2. Bradford Crown Court — After a six-day trial, the appellant was convicted of producing cannabis and sentenced to two years’ imprisonment.