R v Demi Leigh Greening

Sentencing guidelines provide an invaluable starting point, not a fixed tariff. The sentencing court must consider the particular features of the offending and offender, including circumstances that make a burglary materially different from the usual intrusion into a stranger’s home. A sentence above the guideline starting point may be justified, but the overall balancing exercise must remain proportionate. The Court of Appeal may intervene where that exercise produces a sentence that is too high and substitute an appropriate sentence. Even where custody is inevitable, the circumstances may demonstrate the practical value of ordering a pre-sentence report.

The appellant pleaded guilty in the Crown Court at Kingston-upon-Hull to burglary, fraud and escape. She received 45 months for burglary, six months concurrent for fraud and two months consecutive for escape, producing a total sentence of 47 months. A restraining order was also made.

The burglary involved entry to the home of an elderly and ill complainant, theft of her purse and subsequent use of her bank card. The appellant had previous convictions, including two youth-court burglary convictions, and was treated as subject to the three-strikes provisions of the Sentencing Act 2020. She appealed on the grounds that insufficient weight had been given to the age of those convictions and that the sentence was excessive. The central issue was whether the burglary sentence was too high.

1. Disposition. The appeal was allowed in part. The 45-month burglary sentence was quashed. The court assessed the sentence after trial at four years and, applying the agreed 25 per cent reduction for the guilty plea, substituted three years. The concurrent fraud sentence and consecutive escape sentence remained unchanged, giving a total sentence of three years and two months.
2. Burglary sentence. The court held that the five-year sentence after trial was too high. The Sentencing Council guidelines were an invaluable starting point, and the judge was entitled to sentence above the three-year starting point. However, the balancing exercise should not have produced a sentence as high as five years.
3. Particular circumstances. The sentencing assessment should have allowed for the appellant’s young age, desperately difficult background, drug addiction and associated problems. The burglary also had features somewhat removed from the ordinary intrusion into a stranger’s home. The appellant had previously stayed at the property and claimed that she believed money was owed to her or another occupant. The court stressed that this consideration did not diminish the complainant’s suffering and did not lay down a general principle.
4. Previous convictions. The court rejected the criticism concerning the earlier burglary convictions because the sentencing judge had expressly given little weight to them, having regard to the fact that they were committed when the appellant was under 18. The three-strikes provision under section 314 of the Sentencing Act 2020 formed part of the sentencing background.
5. Pre-sentence report. Although not laying down a rule, the court observed that the case pointed towards the wisdom of ordering a pre-sentence report even where custody appeared inevitable.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): The appeal was allowed in part. The burglary sentence was reduced from 45 months to three years; the other sentences remained unchanged. [2026] EWCA Crim 277
• Crown Court at Kingston-upon-Hull: The appellant pleaded guilty to burglary, fraud and escape and received a total sentence of 47 months’ imprisonment.