Sentences were increased for 137 criminals through the Unduly Lenient Sentence (ULS) scheme in 2017.
Victims, prosecutors and members of the public can ask for certain Crown Court sentences to be reviewed under the ULS if they think the sentence is too low. The Attorney General’s Office or Solicitor General then asks the Court of Appeal to review if they believe the judge made a gross error in sentencing.
The crimes involved were: rape and serious sexual offences (58); homicide and related (15); burglary, theft, fraud or other acquisitive offence (19); serious assault (19); firearm-related (8); drug-related (4); kidnap and false imprisonment (2); and other (12).
In total, 173 sentences were referred to the Court of Appeal for reconsideration, compared to 190 in 2016. Some 943 requests were received by the Attorney General’s Office, an increase on the 837 received in 2016. To give context, about 80,000 Crown Court cases are heard each year.
The scheme was extended last year to include 19 terror-related offences including supporting extremist organisations, encouraging acts of terrorism and failing to disclose information about a terrorist attack.
The Solicitor General Robert Buckland QC MP said: ‘We only have 28 days from the date of sentencing to refer a case to the Court of Appeal.
‘Unusually, there is no way to extend this deadline—this means we require a referral very early in the process to be able to deal with it in time. A sentencing exercise is not an exact science and in the vast majority of cases, judges get it right. For an offence there is a range within which a judge might sentence properly.’
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