Move to give all victims of crime right to appeal soft sentences

The police and crime commissioner, Dame Vera Baird, has warned that victims of crime should be allowed to appeal 'soft' or lenient sentences. 

 

Thousands of victims are currently not allowed to appeal sentences given to their attackers which affects up to a third of victims of serious crimes. 

 

Certain crimes are part of a statutory scheme which allows victims to appeal sentences imposed which they believe are "unduly lenient". However crimes such as domestic abuse, stalking and careless driving are not included in the scheme.

 

Of those victims who were allowed to appeal between 2015 and 2018, only 14% of cases resulted in harsher punishments for their attackers.

 

Dame Vera has called for this to change: "The point of the unduly lenient sentence scheme when it was introduced over 30 years ago was to make sure someone who had been deeply affected by crime could ask the Attorney General to consider whether the sentence handed down by a trial court was unduly lenient. There has never been a systematic review and there are now obvious cases which should be included."

 

One of the cases she is referring to includes the families of young children whose indecent images were distributed to paedophiles by Vanessa George, a nursery nurse. It was reported earlier this week that George, who has been in prison since 2009, is now due for release. 

 

Another case involves Olympic cyclist Chris Boardman, whose mother was killed by a careless driver.

 

Both cases do not fall under the scheme to appeal unduly lenient sentences and therefore victims had to accept any sentence imposed by the courts. 

 

Director of the Victims Rights Campaign, Harry Fletcher said: "The scheme must keep up with the times."

 

The Attorney General's spokeswoman said they would be reviewing the scope of the scheme and changes were being considered. 

 

Nottingham Crime Solicitors