The Supreme Court ruled that the rape sentence must be assessed in the context of the knife threat that facilitated it and the victim’s overnight confinement. The Court of Appeal had been wrong to consider the rape in isolation from the threat, the Supreme Court said. It did not set a final sentence, saying that would follow after further submissions.
The case concerns an accused identified in the judgment as FE, convicted of rape and several threats, and who pleaded guilty to an attempted serious harm offence and an assault arising from a later hammer attack. The rape took place in the family home on 25 May 2014. The judgment says the accused threatened the victim with a knife, raped her, and kept her in fear until she was able to leave the next morning. A small child was nearby.
The Central Criminal Court imposed a 14-year headline sentence for rape, reduced to 10 years after mitigation, with two years suspended. It also imposed sentences for threats and the later attack, all concurrent, and a five-year post-release supervision order. The Court of Appeal reduced the rape headline sentence to 12 years and suspended 18 months after mitigation, leaving eight years and six months to serve. The accused’s appeal against conviction had been unsuccessful.
The Director of Public Prosecutions appealed the sentence decision. The Supreme Court explained that sentencing must take account of the circumstances and connected events that make up a crime, while respecting verdicts and not increasing punishment for separate offences that were not proved. Here, the threat in the kitchen led to the rape, and the rape and threat were part of the same event, which ended when the victim left the house.
The Court distinguished those events from later conduct. It said the threats after the rape and the hammer attack in August were separate crimes, though they could support consecutive sentences. Any overall sentence must respect the totality principle, so the combined punishment remains just and proportionate.
The judgment also discussed sentencing principles and rape sentencing precedents, including the need to weigh aggravating and mitigating circumstances. It clarified the legal approach but left the sentence unresolved. The Court said it would hear final submissions before approving and finalising the sentence.