Sentencing guidelines
Sir – On April 1, the Sentencing Council introduced new mitigating factors to all offence-specific guidelines for adult offenders. Neither Charles Hymas’s article (“Judges to look at softer sentences for ‘deprived’ criminals’”, report, April 3) nor Esther Mcvey’s (“Patronising sentencing guidelines make a joke of equality before the law”, Comment, April 4) properly reflects the council’s decision.
Ms Mcvey states that the new guidelines are “telling judges and magistrates they must consider ‘difficult and/or deprived background or personal circumstances’ when sentencing”. That is not the effect of this new mitigating factor. The guidelines state that these things “may be relevant” when considering the offender’s culpability and/or the effect of the sentence on the offender. The emphasis on the word “may” is as it appears in the guidelines. As is said later in the piece, “judges should always be free to make decisions based on the facts of the case in front of them”. The new guidance does not affect that freedom at all.
The article’s wider point is that the new mitigating factors could create a two-tier justice system, with some people having leeway to commit crimes based on their background. The guidelines are concerned only with the sentence to be imposed on someone convicted of an offence. Nothing in any guidelines can provide “a free pass to breaking the law”.
The council is an independent body, made up of representatives of prosecution, defence, policing, probation, academia and victims, as well as experienced judges. Moreover, the mitigating factors were the subject of a lengthy public consultation last year. The council received many responses, approximately two-thirds of which broadly agreed with the guidelines being introduced. The House of Commons Justice Committee also supported them, saying they would “promote consistency of sentencing”.
I acknowledge that the Secretary of State for Justice did not support the new mitigating factors. He said that presupposing that deprivation “indicates a propensity to commit crime risks appearing patronising at best”. With respect to him, that is not what the guidelines indicate. The guidelines say that a deprived background may be relevant to an offender’s responsibility. As many of the judges commented in discussion with the council about the new factor, that is no more than a reflection of well-established sentencing practice. Lord Justice William Davis
Chairman, Sentencing Council London WC2